THE BEGINNING OF MAP 
ME WHAT BECOMES OFHIRi 

L YS AN 3D E 1 it S A L M OH RICHARD'S 




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THE BEGINNING OF MAN 
AND WHAT BECOMES OF HIM 



BY 

Lysander Salmon Richards 

Author of " Vocophy," Indicating the Calling One is Best Fitted to 
Follow (Published in 1881)— 2. "Breaking Up, The Birth, De- 
velopment and Death of Our Planet in Story " — 3. The 
Universe: a Description in Brief" — 4. "The 
History of Marshfield in Two Volumes ' ' — 
5. ' 'New Propositions in Speculative 
and Practical Philosophy 



1915 



Copyright 191 5 
By Lysander S. Richards 



Printed by 
The Rapid Service Press, 
530 Atlantic Ave., 
Boston, Mass. 



AUG 10 1915 

©CI.A411107 



PREFACE. 

This book was written when arriving at 
eighty years of age, and it is the matured 
thought of one who has been a constant student 
through his long life. That others may profit 
by reading the pages of this book is the sincere 
wish of the author, who would be glad to hear 
from anyone who receives any light or glad 
tidings in reading it. 

L. S. RICHARDS. 

Marshfield Hills, 
Massachusetts, U. S. A., 1915. 



CONTENTS. 



Chaptek I. 

Eternity; Looking Backward 7 

Chapter II. 

The Birth of Man 15 

Chapter III. 

Something to Worship 19 

Chapter IV. 

Man and What Becomes of Him 27 

Chapter V. 

Continuous Life 31 

Chapter VI. 

Spirit Versus Matter 37 

Chapter VII. 

Identity, Individuality Preserved 41 

Chapter VIII. 

Man's Desire 47 

Chapter IX. 

Certainties of Law and Order in the Universe 49 

Chapter X. 

Life Beyond Demonstrated 52 

Chapter XI. 

Continued Evidences 58 

Chapter XII. 

Eternalism and Eternalists 72 

Chapter XIII. 

Possibilities of Electrical Communications 74 

Chapter XIV. 

Conditions of Life in the World Beyond 77 

Chapter XV. 

Animal Life in the Hereafter 82 

Chapter XVI. 

Continuity of Plant Life 93 

Chapter XVII. 

The Vastness of the Universe 9S 

Chapter XVIII. - 

The Destiny of the Earth and Its Inhabitants 103 

Chapter XIX. 

The Earth's Development . 109 

Chapter XX. 

The Stars in Space 113 

Chapter XXI. 

Electrical Future 117 

Ch after XXII. 
Bight Living 120 



CHAPTER I. 



Eternity; Looking Backward. 

We cannot count the beginning of man by- 
years, ages or cycles, for when the earth began 
its formation from a gaseous, nebula mass, man 
was there in both matter and spirit life. 

It may be asked, How could man have 
existed in that boiling, fiery, gaseous mass? 
Matter which constituted the component parts 
of his body could have existed in a gaseous state 
as readily as it does when that body dies and 
disintegrates and passes into a gaseous state. 

Was the form of man in his bodily condition 
the same then as we now see him today peram- 
bulating the earth? Certainly not, but all that 
goes to the makeup of a man was there. Open 
a bean and the form of a matured plant is vis- 
ible, all filled, in its undeveloped state, the 
stem, the rootlet, the cotyledons, all folded com- 
pactly before the bean begins to separate and 
unfold itself in its development in the ground. 
The same is true of the germ of man. But it 
may be said that may be all right for the body, 
but what of the spirit, the life in the body. No 
fiery furnace is powerful enough to destroy the 
spirit, the life that permeates the body, that is 
not combustible, or destructible. I claim that 



7 



Eternity; Looking Backward. 

the spirit or life of man has been developing 
since the world began in some form of matter, 
in some beginning of animal life or it may be 
plant life. It appears to me that it is as pre- 
posterous to claim that man began as a material 
and spiritual body at birth into the world as to 
claim that Adam sprang into existence upon the 
planet a full grown man. When the earth 
came into existence and separated from the cen- 
tral mass, the sun, in its vapory, gaseous state, 
all the elements which the plant and animal 
life contains were a part and parcel of it then; 
not only matter, a ponderable substance, but 
life as a spiritual, ethereal substance ; as in like 
manner the sculptor when he takes a solid piece 
of marble, without any particular form and 
gradually after several months of labor shapes it 
into a human form, and chisels the features and 
expression peculiar to the original when living. 
So was it in the process and development of 
humans. 

I am reminded of the sculptor, who chis- 
eled the statue in the Boston Public Garden, 
a statue representing a physician administer- 
ing ether to a wounded patient, commemorating 
the discovery of ether by Dr. Morton of Massa- 
chusetts. The sculptor, a Mr. Berry, who also 
chiseled the Massachusetts Coat of Arms, an 
Indian, for the Massachusetts block of granite 



3 



Eternity; Looking Backward. 

in the Washington monument at Washington, 
some 60 or more years ago, said if he found the 
Ether statue was not absolutely perfect, when 
ready to be placed on the Public Garden 
grounds, he would take a sledge hammer and 
knock it to pieces; and when completed he 
asked the committee in charge if it was satis- 
factory, if in fact it was perfect. One of the com- 
mittee replied "No!" the sculptor's countenance 
fell, discouraged. "No!" the committee man 
said, "there is only one fault with it. You did 
not make it speak." So perfect was the repre- 
sentation of the physician and the expression 
of his suffering patient, that it seemed the 
statue must talk. Is it to be supposed that the 
spirit jumps into the human form at its concep- 
tion or birth? Believers in transmigration have 
some such notion, only in different form, re-in- 
carnated in a lower order of animal life than 
humans, at its re-birth on our planet again; 
that notion has but very few adherents among 
civilized nations, but it is as reasonable as that 
it jumps into a human being at conception or 
birth. The Powers that be, said to the bean in 
the pod and the kernel of corn: "Get down 
to earth, you've got all the material in you 
necessary, everything that goes to reproduce 
another bean or corn, the root, the stem and the 
leaf; go to work and unfold, develop and grow 



9 



Eternity; Looking Backward. 

and multiply your species." and so the "Powers" 
said to our planetary system: "Get to work, 
Mr. Nebula, break off a piece of the ethereal 
nebula mass floating" in space, get yourself 
together and go to work, separate yourself into 
rings and globes, develop and develop. You 
have all the elements within your gaseous mass 
that go to build up bodies, both plants and 
animals, and eventually, the highest order of 
animals, humans;" and so it did. The earth 
separated from its father and mother, the 
central mass, the sun, into rings and then con- 
solidated into a globe. Time rolled on. Years 
and ages before its gaseous material condensed 
into water, and the earth became a one uni- 
versal ocean. The thicker, heavier liquid mass 
in the center contained the metals and rocks 
of which the earth is now composed and on the 
surface solidified. The rocks and metals then 
began to appear above the ocean as islands 
and continents, and being composed of numer- 
ous chemical elements, began to disintegrate 
and pulverize in various ways by the erosive 
action of water, wind and frosts into soil, and, 
in time, covered a portion of the globe, and 
while all this process was going on and during 
its entire development from its beginning my 
existence was developing, body and spirit, out 
of this chaotic heap; and when it was ripe 



10 



Eternity; Looking Backward. 

enough, it formed and shaped an animal in its 
most simple and minute stature. I was in it, 
and through all the stages of animal and 
spiritual development in its various progressive 
types. I grew and in process of time I became 
a man and passed through various births from 
the lowest types to the present advanced state 
of civilization; through generation after gen- 
eration, until the time was ripe for my birth and 
advent as an individual prepared to walk and 
hold my own as a separate, independent entity 
on the face of the earth. 

I have been millions of years developing into 
my present manifest existence upon the earth. 
It has taken many, many, many generations in 
my development to ripen or mature my visible 
advent here. Our Bible says in substance that 
Christ sprang from David, many generations 
before ; that David begat Solomon, and Solomon 
begat his son, and so on, generation after 
generation, until Jesus Christ was reached and 
developed; not that Christ or anybody else 
sprang into existence from the womb of his 
mother as a new being in the twinkling of an 
eye, but that his spirit and material body had 
been developing through all the generations 
from David down and so with all of us. The 
time was not ripe when our grandfather, or our 
great-great-grandfathers or grandmothers lived 



11 



Eternity; Looking Backward. 



for us to be born. We had not sufficiently 
developed. Like the great, magnificent Bald- 
win apple of today, which has grown to such 
prodigious proportions, in some instances meas- 
uring a foot in circumference, or the luscious, 
mammoth strawberry, grown to measure a half 
a foot around, both of which I have grown to 
the size stated. It took a great many genera- 
tions in the growth of each to produce such 
enormous, magnificent specimens. One or two 
centuries ago each of these species of fruit was 
but a pigmy in comparison to the present size, 
years, aye centuries, it has taken to reach its 
present high standard, and so is it with man. 
Man is the highest manifestation of all beings 
and all nature existing. It has taken cycles of 
time to develop him to his present high 
standard. When we think of it meditatively, 
what do we native New Englanders mean when 
we speak of "springing from our Pilgrim or 
Colonial ancestors 300 years ago," through 
eight or nine generations back? Is not that a 
contradiction of the notion that our existence 
began in our mother's womb ? But rather that 
we have been developing not only generations 
back to the Pilgrims 300 years ago but way 
back and back to time immemorial. What 
does the now generally accepted theory of 
hereditary transmission mean? It means that 



12 



Eternity; Looking Backward. 



our body, our mind, soul and spirit has been 
transmitted from our ancestors, way back and 
back from time immemorial through generation 
after generation. "Blood will tell," it is said. 

The germ of every human being in its own 
separate individuality existed at the beginning 
or formation of our planet and it has taken all 
these millions of years to develop and get me 
sufficiently ripe through all manner of different 
stages of life and forms of life, through gen- 
eration after generation until I was sufficiently 
advanced to make my visible advent into the 
present era of the world. 

We often hear it stated that a child or an 
adult inherited a certain disposition, or peculiar- 
ity, or some phase of physical imperfection, or 
disease, way back from his grandfather or his 
great-grandfather or grandmother. 

Even the beginning of man does not date at 
the formation or beginning of the world, but 
back, back, way back of that. It is not possible 
for the mind of man to comprehend his begin- 
ning, any more than the babe right from its 
mother's womb can comprehend its advent 
upon the earth. The universe has always ex- 
isted. It could not have been otherwise, for 
something cannot come from nothing, and man 
must be part and parcel of it. Recognizing the 
fact that the universe always was, we cannot 



13 



Eternity; Looking Backward. 

conceive of any possibility of man or any ani- 
mal, or plant life, existing outside of it, separate 
and apart. Multitudinous changes of form in 
his life-development were constant through 
eternity. Even Plato, nearly 2,500 years ago, 
argued that if the soul was immortal, then it 
was also pre-existent. Immortality and pre- 
existence in his mind stood and fell together. 
"If it be so" he said "that the very essence of 
the soul implies Life, then the life must have 
an eternal past as well as a never ending 
future." 

The theologian may say that God created 
the Universe and that nothing is impossible 
with Him. Although believing in a God, (not 
a personal or an individual being), I cannot 
conceive, nor can you, reader, of a beginning to 
Him, any more than a beginning to the Uni- 
verse. He could not have created something 
out of nothing. Eternity knows no beginning 
or ending. 

To God, or the Powers that Be, for years I 
have offered prayer nightly. He, or a better 
word is It, is indefinable. It is beyond my con- 
ception, or that of anybody else. 



14 



CHAPTER II. 



The Birth of Man. 

Now let us investigate the process of man's 
pre-natal formation in the development of his 
birth into the world and his growth through his 
worldly experience to the end upon our planet 
and beyond. Man at his conception into this 
era of the world, began in a single cell. In that 
cell which is infinitesimally small, there is a 
nucleus; in that nucleus is a string-like forma- 
tion called chromatin. This cell, when another 
cell of the opposite sex of the same species 
meets it, unites. This cell substance has here- 
tofore been called Protoplasm, the origin of a 
human being, but in recent years, the Biologists 
are discovering something beyond or back of 
that called the Amoeba, the lowest form of 
animal life. Above the nucleus and chromatin, 
in the cell, there is a fringe like substance called 
centrosome, which divides and with the chro- 
matin form another cell. These cells multiply 
before birth into thousands of cells and in the 
adult reach hundreds of thousands. Now in 
this material substance of the egg or cell after 
the union, is supposed to be the germ or the 
seat of life, spirit, soul. The development con- 
tinues in the infants' pre-natal growth, and at 



15 



The Birth of Man. 



birth, in youth, in middle life and in the aged 
with which we are all familiar. In some it ter- 
minates on the earth prematurely, in others, to 
a very advanced age. 

Now the mind which is identical with 
the life, the spirit and soul of man is the 
motor that regulates the machine of our 
bodies. In the lower animals it develops 
very slowly. Some call it only instinct, but this 
is not the place or time to discuss this much de- 
bated question. The higher the development of 
man, according to Sir Alfred R. Wallace (the 
co-discoverer with Darwin of the Descent of 
Man) , the more helpless he is in infancy. Take 
a chicken, the moment of birth from the egg, it 
is running about with the rapidity and ease of 
its mother hen and eating to nourish life, while 
a human at birth is perfectly helpless and would 
die very soon if not supported and nourished by 
its mother; no animal is so perfectly helpless, 
and how immature, insignificant and unde- 
veloped is its mind, while the chick can select 
its food and devour it, even without the assist- 
ance of the hen, as has been shown in the incu- 
bator and brooder in every land. John Fiske, 
the savant, hints in his writings that the babe 
in its onward growth in the advancement of 
civilization, will become more and more help- 
less as the mind expands to larger and greater 



16 



The Birth of Man. 



possibilities. Look at the Australian savage, 
the lowest and most ignorant human being on 
the face of the earth, who cannot count four in 
his own language, and then at an Edison who 
through his wonderful genius can make a 
wooden image talk and light the world with his 
magic touch. This condition of helplessness in 
the infant as civilization advances is not without 
its use, for as the babe becomes more helpless 
and longer in gaining its independence, the 
mother and father are increasing their affection 
and says Mr. Fiske, "family ties become stronger 
as the dependence of the babe relies on the care 
and parental guidance and affection." 

But the development of the mind, though not 
a part and parcel of the body,, is more or less 
affected by the ills and disabilities of the earthly 
human machine, and organization. A progres- 
sive intellect must not be hampered by a dis- 
ordered brain, and the development of the mind 
depends as much on the exercise of rational and 
studious thought as upon the exercise of the 
limbs and organic functions to live and thrive. 
I can hardly agree with Sir John Lubbock, that 
the infant's mind goes back and is similar in its 
crudeness and simplicity to the undeveloped 
mind of the pre-historic savage. No! its 
mind partaking largely of the traits of its an- 
cestors, it has been developing generation after 



17 



The Birth of Man. 



generation, increasing in its growth from one 
stage to another. The germ of an increased 
and accumulating intelligence is there and is 
capable in due time of a higher development in 
proportion as its hereditary transmission is more 
or less highly developed in its predecessor. The 
mind possesses three functions, feeling, will or 
volition and thought or intellectuality, they 
are inseparable and must work in unity. Con- 
sciousness is an attribute of the mind. In the 
infant the function of feeling is about the extent 
of its conscious activity and later the function of 
the will is developed, and in youth thought is 
beginning to make itself manifest. In conscious- 
ness lies the inherent property of the soul. 



18 



CHAPTER III. 



Something to Worship. 

The soul, whether in the primitive man, or in 
the civilized man of today, must have and has in 
the lapse of ages had something to worship. The 
idolaters of today worship the wonders of 
nature, the sun, the mountains, the seas and 
lakes. As far remote as the history of man 
extends, he has had something to worship 
and this custom has extended through the 
march of civilization in one form or an- 
other. Look at the idols, the Gods discov- 
ered in the ruins of ancient Mexico, cen- 
tral America and Peru, and in the great 
temples of India, Japan and China. Yes even 
in that great center of ancient civilization of 
Greece, they were bound to consult their 
Oracles, their Gods, Jupiter and his train of 
fellow Gods when contemplating the perform- 
ance of any great event. Many nations of the 
East today continue to worship their wooden or 
golden Gods and some animals, such as the 
Sacred Elephant, Sacred Cows and even Ser- 
pents. 

Socrates and his disciples were the reform- 
ers of that age and taught the worship of only 
one God, the God of the Universe. Every 



19 



Something to Worship. 



nation has some idol to worship, even in the 
present advanced state of civilization. India has 
her Buddha and Brahma, Persia has Mahomet 
and Zoroaster and in China, those who have 
advanced far enough to drop the worship of 
their Pagan Gods, worship Confucius and 
those semi-civilized countries, such as Turkey 
and other nations of the East have their 
Mahomet to worship, and Sweden worships 
Swedenborg, and half the civilized world wor- 
ship Jesus Christ, and not only worship His 
memory and spirit, but worship wooden and 
golden images of Him, just as did the idolaters 
of the sunny East. Go into a Roman Catholic 
church and witness the images and paintings of 
Him there, and the idolatrous form of the 
churchmen in falling upon their knees and the 
motions of crossing themselves across their fore- 
heads and breasts in imitation of the crucifix, 
and the High churchmen in the Episcopal 
churches are not far behind the Catholics in 
their idol worship. And the latter go one step 
farther, in worshiping the image of Mary, the 
Mother of Christ, of whom He said: "Forsake 
thy father and mother, even, and follow Me." 
Protestants even who do not perhaps worship a 
wooden or golden image of Christ, worship His 
body, by partaking of the Lord's Supper on a 
communicant Sunday, in commemoration of His 



20 



Something to Worship. 



flesh and blood by tasting of bits of bread and 
wine. This is idolatry in a milder form, and 
only goes to illustrate that the people, it don't 
matter where, in civilized or uncivilized coun- 
tries must have something in their religious 
notions to worship, until they have sufficiently 
developed not to require any visible object to 
worship or imitate, but grow to worship only 
the example, the spirit of the just, and not the 
body which has returned to the Earth, earthy, 
and passed in the way of all flesh and blood 
into the elements that go to make up the Earth. 

The mind is a great deal like an inked rubber 
stamp, you stamp your name and business on 
your card and there it is fixed; so is the mind 
stamped and educated by our predecessors, 
being more or less fixed in certain ideals by our 
forbears and bred in our bones through past 
generations. If your father is a democrat in 
politics the son is generally stamped as one. If 
your parents are Trinitarians in religion, the 
sons and daughters generally follow. They 
were brought up that way, that is part of their 
education. Some are progressive enough to 
stand alone and are not biased by their parents' 
belief. So it becomes perfectly natural for not 
only the Roman Catholic to worship some one 
as God, as Christ and the Virgin Mary, but the 
Protestants, especially the evangelical wing, 



21 



Something to Worship. 



must have somebody to worship and their God 
of worship is Christ. The liberal Christians of 
today, while they do not worship Christ as any 
more divine or Son of God, than Socrates or 
Confucius or any acknowledged good or com- 
paratively perfect man, do recognize Christ as 
coming as near the line of perfection as any man 
of whom history has any knowledge. While 
they do not worship Him as God, or the Trinity 
of three in one, the Father, the Son and the Holy 
Ghost, they do recognize Him as a great ex- 
ample for one to follow, not to worship Him as 
is done by the much larger part of His follow- 
ers, but to regard Him as a fellow man, born and 
developed the same as any other human being; 
and civilization is rapidly reaching that point 
of view, as must be observed in the past half 
century. 

The Jews in the days of Abraham held the 
belief that you must sacrifice some body either 
human or an innocent lamb, or calf as a blood 
sacrifice to appease the wrath of God. Abra- 
ham at first proposed to offer as a sacrifice his 
son, but finally modified this barbarity by offer- 
ing the living body of a lamb or goat as a blood 
sacrifice. 

So was it in ancient Mexico in the days of the 
Montezumas, they had a Sacrificial stone on 
which thousands of human living bodies were 



22 



Something to Worship. 



offered as a blood sacrifice to appease the wrath 
of an angry God, and so it was in the time of 
Christ when He was crucified upon the cross, 
and those who believed in a wrathful God, be- 
lieved that God demanded this sacrifice to ap- 
pease His wrath, for the sins of men, but since 
then it has become a universal belief among 
nearly all Christian believers, both conservative 
and progressive, that God is love, that no longer 
is He that monster of fear and wrath that has 
been pictured of Him for centuries. If Christ 
had been crucified today, would it be advocated 
that it was necessary to appease the wrath of 
God? No! It would be pronounced as the 
height of folly and barbarism to think for a 
moment that God would have been so cruel as 
to demand such a useless, nonsensical sacrifice, 
as did Abraham or the Mexican Aztecs of old 
in demanding the blood of the "Innocents" for 
such a monstrosity. If God created man, would 
He have made such a blunder as to create man 
"in His own image" and send down "His only 
begotten Son" upon the earth to be butchered 
as a sacrifice for his own mistakes in not per- 
fecting man? No ! What a monstrous proceed- 
ing would it be called today if a government 
in a civilized country should be set up with a 
ruler on the throne advocating and practicing 
that heathenish torture and cruelty to satisfy 



Something to Worship. 



his brutal thirst for blood among his own sub- 
jects. Love now and all the time, and forever 
has been all that God desires and no innocent 
blood of man or beast as a sacrifice to Him, and 
no Cross erected over an enlightened world is 
required to remind Him of a cruelty that His 
great love could never have demanded. 

Let the memory of Christ be treasured as a 
great example of human purity, and His soul 
and spirit worshipped as our great leader, and 
not His blood or body as a useless cruel sacrifice. 
No intelligent, thoughtful, unbiased person can 
think for a moment that His material body rose 
up into space and was preserved from decay, 
nor can one doubt that His material body nine- 
teen centuries ago decomposed and passed into 
the Earth from whence it originated, but never- 
theless professed Christians to all appearances 
worship wooden or golden and painted images 
of Christ's material body with all the devotion 
of a Pagan fanatic. I will not concede to any 
one a greater admiration of the Spirit, the Soul 
or the life of Christ embodying the splendid 
precepts and noble works that marked his 
eventful and wonderful life. That is what I 
worship, devotedly worship, but not His form, 
His body which passed into the Earth centuries 
ago. Christian converts talk and plead with 
him as though His earthly body was floating 



24 



Something to Worship. 



somewhere above in the starry heavens, and 
sitting on a throne at the right hand of God. 
If there is any such thing as progress in the 
other life, Christ cannot be hovering about the 
Earth. His spirit or soul, like undoubtedly other 
noble spirits, rose, and advanced higher centu- 
ries ago, beyond the attractions of this material 
world into realms of advanced spiritual life and 
thought. I said I concede to no one a greater 
admiration of the life work of Christ, that pure 
and noble soul, but that is not saying I would 
not have the same admiration and worship for 
any other soul whose life upon the Earth was 
equally as pure and good as Christ. 

It may be due to my ignorance of the thou- 
sands of pure and grand lives of the past that I 
do not know of one His equal. Socrates, as far 
as we know, lived an ideal life. His conversa- 
tions with the Greeks were fine examples of an 
upright life and when he was convicted and sen- 
tenced to die, he laid down his life for the advo- 
cacy of a principle and notwithstanding the 
offering of a chance to escape, he went to his 
death with the spirit of a martyr, a sacrifice for 
the good of mankind, and refusing to escape 
because it would be disobedient to the laws of 
the State, which he believed in obeying to the 
letter ; and yet I cannot say that I have as pro- 
found an admiration, or worship, of his life as 



25 



Something to Worship. 



of Christ, because I am not as well informed of 
his work and teachings as the biblical history 
of the life Christ gives us. In the writings of 
Rev. I. H. Ingraham, in describing the times of 
biblical Moses in Egypt, where Rameses, one 
of the princes, is made to say "My own Religion 
individually is spiritual, but how shall I present 
a spiritual faith to the Egyptians? In what 
form, what visible shape can I offer it to them ; 
for the priests will demand a visible religion, 
one tangible and material. How can I make 
others possess that consciousness which is only 
intuitive, I must know what God is before I can 
direct the people whither to look for Him when 
they pray. I must first cultivate their minds and 
imaginations in order to enable them to embrace 
a purely mental religion and to worship the In- 
finite independently of figures, images and visi- 
ble mementos or symbols, for so long as they 
have these at all they will rest their faith in 
them and look upon them as their God." 



26 



CHAPTER IV. 



Man and What Becomes of Him. 

The title of this book reads "The Beginning 
of Man and What Becomes of Him." I have 
endeavored in the early part of the volume to 
solve the problem of the Beginning of Man, now 
it devolves upon me to try and solve the prob- 
lem "What Becomes of Him." In the first place 
it will be necessary to show whether there is 
anything, beside the material body which we 
possess and see moving about us. The material- 
ists say that life is a part and parcel of the body 
and inseparable and when that body dies and 
decomposes and returns to earth, life is buried 
with it. The Biologist who makes neither pro 
nor con any claim of being a materialist gives 
in nearly all of his works in the formation of 
a human being in its pre-natal state, the seat of 
life as dwelling in the cell called protoplasm 
and in that protoplasm is a substance called 
nucleus, heretofore mentioned, also an infinitesi- 
mal thread like matter called Chromatin and 
another called Chromosmere or Psychomere. 
I have explained in preceding pages this forma- 
tion and how the cell and union of separate sex 
cells unite and their multiplication and develop- 
ment. These little cells are extremely minute 



27 



Man and What Becomes of Him. 

and are supposed, roughly estimated, to be one 
millionth the weight of our bodies and each of 
these cells average about 1000 atoms. Hence 
when the material body, the machine gives out, 
these particles described, psychomeres, the life 
in these germs passes out of the body and leaves 
the latter to decompose and pass into the 
ground. 

The memory, the will and the intelligence, 
component parts of the soul, spirit and life, de- 
part from the decomposing body just the same 
as the butterfly separates and casts off its cocoon 
or emerges from its chrysalis and is trans- 
formed into a full fledged winged insect. Some- 
times the body is developed to maturity, but 
oftener not, but it does not matter when the 
machine gives out, the body falls to the earth 
and the life and spirit pass beyond. 

As to whether the soul, the spirit, needs the 
experience of Earth life to its fullest develop- 
ment may be thought immaterial, but it is my 
belief that the greater experience a being passes 
through on Earth, the better prepared is he for 
the life beyond. 

The Earth experience is a great school for us. 
A lazy, good for nothing being who makes no 
effort for improvement has missed his oppor- 
tunity and does not profit by his experience. I 
will be obliged here to refer in part to one of 



28 



Man and What Becomes of Him. 

my former publications, to a chapter on "Life 
Beyond the Grave." 

For thousands of years the proposition of im- 
mortality has been discussed and should the 
world exist five hundred thousand more, it will 
still continue to be questioned by the majority 
of the inhabitants on the Globe, for time or 
eternity will never settle the problem in their 
minds while spirit and matter remain two dis- 
tinct uncombined elements, with our senses 
totally incompetent in themselves to analyze 
and detect spirit which is an intangible and im- 
ponderable force. The question will always be 
an open one as it is only through our material 
senses that all solid and positive facts are de- 
termined and settled. 

If the thinker, however, outsteps the bounds 
of material knowledge and experiences, into the 
realm of thought and reason and views the 
spirit, the beyond in the light of Philosophy and 
Common Sense, his faith will be founded upon 
a rock. In my extensive travels over the Ameri- 
can Continent, nothing surprised me more in 
conversing with the masses than the incredulity, 
the increasing unbelief, the general doubt of an 
existence beyond the grave, and the alarming 
increase is not confined to a scattered few, but 
found among all classes. We have relied too 
much upon old time authority and less upon our 



29 



Man and What Becomes of Him. 

common sense and reason. When we have 
grown large and broad enough to realize the 
use of the Powers God has given us and through 
which alone we are placed pre-eminently above 
the entire animal kingdom, we shall have larger 
comprehension, and look as never before into 
the great future and life eternal. 



30 



CHAPTER V. 



Continuous Life. 

What is matter? "It is the substance" in the 
words of Webster "of which all bodies are con- 
stituted, or that which is visible or tangible." 
In illustration take a locomotive on the railroad 
track attached to a passenger car. Instruct it to 
move. When would you reach New York by the 
train if the locomotive was left to itself to start? 
No, you say there must be force applied to it to 
propel it. Who is to apply this? You say man. 
Suppose we take one just asleep in death and 
place him on the locomotive with full instruc- 
tions to run the machine. Your request is met, 
but it does not move. Why not? All the con- 
ditions dependent on matter are satisfied. Can 
you call to mind any form of matter that will of 
itself meet the case and send the locomotive on 
its mission to the Metropolis? Is there any 
chemist on our planet inventive enough to so 
compound or unite matter in any form or shape 
to meet the desired end? None! But if all 
there is to man is the matter of which his body 
is composed, how do you account for this pro- 
cedure. It is something outside of matter that 
is required to move and direct it, is it not? 
What is that something? Is it force? Steam is 



31 



Continuous Life. 



generated in the engine and thus through the 
force of heat and motion the locomotive moves, 
but did these forces in themselves, without help 

or assistance, alone and in their own power move 
it? Is there not something behind these forces 
which sets them in operation? Who generated 
and applied the steam? Man. What, the ma- 
terial man ? The deceased whose body is all there 
is of him? Have we not found then that there 
is something behind matter, something behind 
the force even that moves it. It is the life, the 
soul, spirit, embodied in his material body, that 
is the power behind the throne that moves it. 
It is no known force identical with matter as we 
have attempted to demonstrate. It is life or 
spirit, both one and the same thing. Galvani 
the discoverer of Galvanic Electricity, in a work 
published at Bologne in 1793 for the Institute 
of Science, says : "In dissecting a frog on a table 
wherein stood an electrical machine, the limbs 
suddenly became convulsed by one of his pupils 
touching crural nerves with a dissecting knife" 
and hence Galvani entertained the opinion that 
the muscular action is attributable to electricity 
and looked upon his phenomena as a confirma- 
tion of that theory and pursued the enquiry with 
great zeal. He attached the legs of frogs to a 
pointed conductor fixed at the top of his house 
and found that they were violently convulsed 



32 



Continuous Life. 



by every flash of lightning. Similar effects, 
though not so strong, were also brought about 
by atmospherical electricity, during a thunder 
storm. As the effect was produced without any 
apparent external excitement of the electrical 
fluid, Galvani inferred in accordance with his 
preconceived hypothesis that the muscular con- 
traction was caused by animal electricity. 
Physiologists eagerly seized hold of this as the 
assigned cause of vital energy and abandoned 
the agency of the nervous force for that of elec- 
tricity. 

Volta, a wiser man and far more eminent in 
science, the true discoverer of Voltaic Electric- 
ity, now applied throughout the civilized world, 
annihilated the theory that the exciting cause 
resided in the animal fibres and contended that 
the muscular contractions produced when the 
muscle and the nerves were connected by a 
metal arose from the contact of the metal itself 
and was entirely independent of animal elec- 
tricity. In proof of this he instanced the pecu^ 
liar sensation occasioned by the contact of silver 
with a piece of zinc, when both were placed 
upon the tongue. What a blessing it would have 
been to the world if Galvani could have suc- 
ceeded in bringing to life human beings lying 
in their graves by the application of electricity 
to the limbs, that would have been a key to the 



33 



Continuous Life. 



resurrection surely, but alas it requires some- 
thing beyond the force of electricity to produce 
the emotions and movements which man, aye 
a live man, exhibits. Dr. Carpenter the dis- 
tinguished scientist advanced the theory that 
Heat is the life, the vital force that animates 
our being and all matter, but with like consist- 
ency he might claim the same preeminence for 
Oxygen, for without the presence of the latter, 
seed could not germinate, nor the egg develop 
into life. 

Experiments without number have been 
tried to produce life into beings; it cannot 
and never will be accomplished. Edison has 
succeeded in making his moving picture talk, 
but it requires the motor, life or spirit in man 
to do it, it did not talk with its own volition. 
What is it that moves our fingers, what is it that 
talks in us and gives expression to our counten- 
ances? Will electricity, heat, motion, light, 
chemical affinity, or any of the correlated 
forces, or magnetism, or any force known to 
man do it? What is it that sparkles the eye 
and gives emotion to our whole being when we 
talk? Something independent of matter and 
the forces, and being independent it cannot be 
deposited with the body in the grave. It is the 
life, soul, spirit, not tangible or ponderable, 
but too ethereal, and spiritual to be entombed. 



34 



Continuous Life. 



The late Prof. Denton, a Geologist, lecturer 
and scientist, with whom I was intimately 
acquainted, cites some illustrative facts which 
are to the point, "Dr. Atkinson," he says, "said, 
'I once had a very remarkable patient who with 
eyes closed could easily read every writing I 
gave her. She read it from the top of her head 
or when placed in her hand, or any part of her 
body, and it was to be noticed in this case that 
the more tightly you blinded her eyes the more 
clearly could she see.' " Here is an instance 
where a person was not obliged to use the 
material eye to read. How soon it loses its trans- 
parency, its brilliancy after life has fled. Be- 
hind the material eye or within it is the spiritual 
vision and in the lady mentioned the spiritual 
was very largely developed, so large that it en- 
abled her to see and read without the use of 
the lens of the material eye. The crystalline 
lens of the eye is simply an instrument for the 
spiritual eye to look through. To prove that the 
matter read by the lady with her eyes closed 
was not due to any familiarity with the writing 
I will cite another instance which he gives: 
Dr. Colby of Stamstead, Canada, informed him 
that he had a patient who read from a paper 
just new from the press, before it was possible 
for her to see and read it, with her eyes 
bandaged and a tea tray between her eyes and 



35 



Continuous Life. 



the paper. Here was reading matter entirely- 
new to everybody but the printer and editor. 
What is it that enabled her to see and read 
without the use of even her material eyes? Was 
it matter or any of the known forces? It is that 
power, that something which you and I possess 
and everybody possesses; namely, life, spirit 
and a soul. 



36 



CHAPTER VI. 



Spirit Versus Matter. 

During sleep our bodies are apparently in 
perfect rest, but in our dreams the mind, the 
thought, the spirit is active. Says Dr. Hammond : 
"the brain is in a comparatively bloodless con- 
dition, and the blood in the encephalic vessels is 
not only diminished in quantity, but moves with 
diminished force." Prof. Denton says "If the 
brain is the agent concerned in clairvoyant and 
clairaudent phenomena (its power being very 
much reduced by sleep), we should naturally 
expect it would decrease or destroy its ability 
in this direction, but the very opposite seems to 
be the case, for many who possess no clairvoy- 
ant power in the waking condition have in their 
sleep a remarkable development of it. Dr. 
Carpenter relates that Condorcet saw in his 
dreams the final steps of a difficult calculation 
which had puzzled him during the day, and 
Condillac states that when engaged with his 
course of study he frequently developed and 
finished a subject in his dreams which he had 
broken off before retiring to rest. "Can it be," 
he says, "the brain, the material brain that does 
this in sleep, where it has been unable to accom- 
plish it in the waking state ? We might as well 
suppose a man could run eight miles an hour 



37 



Spirit Versus Matter. 



with his feet shackled, while he could only run 
four when they were free." Denton again cites 
Lydia Maria Child, the distinguished author, 
who published the following statement regard- 
ing her deceased friend, Henrietta Sargent. 
"One morning she spoke of not feeling as well 
as usual, but it was regarded by herself and 
others as merely a slight deviation from her 
customary good health. But in the course of the 
day she suddenly fainted away. As the usual 
restoratives produced no effect, the family 
physician was summoned. No better success 
attended his efforts. The breath appeared to 
be entirely suspended, and the limbs remained 
rigid and cold. Her daughters feared she must 
be dead, and the doctor began to be doubtful 
whether animation would ever be restored. 
How long she continued in this state I do not 
remember. But while they were watching her, 
with ever deepening anxiety she gasped feebly 
and, after a while, opened her eyes. When 
she had completely recovered she told her 
daughters she had been standing by them all 
the time, looking upon her lifeless body and 
seeing all they did to resuscitate it and she 
astonished them by repeating the minutest de- 
tails of all that had been said or done by them 
and the doctor during her prolonged state of 
utter insensibility." 



38 



Spirit Versus Matter. 



Both Mrs. Child and Mrs. Sargent quoted 
above were in my early days noted Abo- 
litionists, friends and co-laborers with Garri- 
son and Wendell Phillips. I knew of them 
as profound thinkers, conscientious, and honest 
participants in the Anti-slavery meetings which 
I also as an Abolitionist attended. Her spirit 
had partly left the body at that time, as like 
instances on other occasions of others have been 
known. It is then evident that the spirit acts 
independently of the living body at times. What 
then prevents its living after the final separa- 
tion for all time? If it is as active when the 
body at night is asleep and dead as it were to 
all the world about it, what is there to prevent 
the spirit being active when the body is com- 
pletely dead, and laid separately aside? 

"What is it in the Mesmeric and Hyp- 
notic operator that compels another to do 
his bidding? Take the life principle, the 
spirit away from the man, the body would 
exhibit poor results in this direction. It is 
the will, the spirit in the body of the Mes- 
merizer, the Hypnotizer that is in rapport 
with the spirit in the body of his subject that 
wills him to do as he pleases, the one is posi- 
tively charged with a strong spirit, the other 
negatively, with a weaker spirit. Dr. Foissac 
magnetized Paul Villegrand at a distance of 



39 



Spirit Versus Matter. 



three hundred miles. It is said of him, "The 
doctor gave a note to Paul's father which 
he desired him to hand to Paul when he 
arrived on a certain day at half past 5 
P. M. It read thus: 'I am magnetizing you 
at this moment. I will awaken you when 
you have had a quarter of an hour's sleep/ 
But the father to make the experiment decisive, 
never gave the letter to his son, nevertheless at 
ten minutes before six, Paul being in the midst 
of his family, explained a sensation of heat and 
considerable uneasiness. His clothing was wet 
with perspiration; he wished to retire to his 
room, but they detained him. In a few minutes 
he was entranced. In this state he astonished 
the persons present by reading with his eyes 
shut several leaves of a book taken at hazard 
from the library and by telling the hour upon 
his watch, they held up to him. He awoke in 
a quarter of an hour. ,, Here was a clear case 
of a spirit acting upon spirit in the body, not 
matter upon matter, at the great distance of 300 
miles from each other and if the spirit in a living 
body can control another spirit in the body, out- 
side and beyond it, what is to prevent the spirit 
out of the body in the spirit world influencing 
a spirit in the body when conditions are right 
for such control. 



40 



CHAPTER VII. 



Identity, Individuality Preserved. 

The question now arises whether this life force 
or spirit manifested in different bodies is suf- 
ficiently individualized to enable it to preserve 
its identity throughout eternity; or in other 
words will each of us live and continue our per- 
sonality through eternity individualized in one 
person as upon the earth, an individual entity, 
a spiritual body dispossessed of matter, or is it 
swallowed up in a Universal life or spirit mass 
pervading the Universe? Advocates of the 
latter notion tell us that a drop of water falls 
into the ocean, mingles and is lost in the great 
liquid mass, its individuality and identity ceases, 
as does the life or spirit departing from the body 
pass into the great universal life or spirit mass. 
Let us see if this illustration holds good. Water 
is made up of two elements, Oxygen and Hydro- 
gen and the smallest particle into which a drop 
can be divided is a Molecule. Picture in mind 
the smallest particle of water imaginable and 
divide it a million times and it is not re- 
duced to the size of a Molecule. Each Molecule, 
the base of all matter wherever found, and in 
whatever shape or form, is always unalterable 
and ever retains its individuality and so do 



41 



Identity, Individuality Preserved. 

atoms, much more minute of which the mole- 
cule is composed. Oxygen we obtain from 
water, air and very many different com- 
pounds, also from rocks through past geo- 
logical ages, from the Silurian and the Azoic 
to the Tertiary, and if through the vast extent 
of time, millions and millions of years, any 
change was effected in the properties, the 
specimens would manifest it, but no change is 
manifested. Hydrogen the other component 
part of a drop of water is also procured from 
coal, water, etc. Two litres of any specimen of 
Hydrogen will combine with one litre of Oxygen 
and will form two litres of vapor of water. If 
by lying in rocks through all the geological 
epochs of the past, passing through the volcanic 
and heat changes to which the rock has been 
subject in the past, or in space, dashing along 
as comets and meteors of which it is part and 
parcel, if any change or modification in the 
molecule or atoms had occurred, these relations 
of Oxygen and Hydrogen above mentioned 
would no longer exist, but the same proportion 
of combination between those two elements 
exist today as millions of years ago, showing 
that the individuality or identity of the Mole- 
cule of Oxygen and Hydrogen composing the 
drop of water is preserved through all time. Is 
it any less probable that the life or spirit dwell- 



42 



Identity, Individuality Preserved. 

ing in innumerable and individual forms in the 
space beyond will preserve its identity through 
whatever changes the mass of matter with 
which it is connected may pass. 

The material body of man changes or wastes 
away, the Physiologists say, once in seven years, 
not one particle of his body in any form remain- 
ing at the end of that time. The change is very 
gradual, the waste of the entire body is con- 
stant; and it is to supply this great waste that 
we are obliged to eat, thus furnishing a new 
body constantly and gradually as the latter is 
wasting. Sleep is a brake put upon the body at 
night to stop the waste going on in our waking 
hours. Eating supplies the waste going on. It 
may be said that if the body wastes away in 
seven years and a new body is constantly form- 
ing during that time why is it that the scars on 
a person's body formed in youth remain on the 
body during old age? I have a couple upon my 
body made when a small boy, that continue on 
my person at 80 years of age. That may be 
explained, as a similar process in the petrifac- 
tion of wood into stone. A strip of it lies in a 
limestone region, the wood slowly decomposes 
and wastes away, and as rapidly as a particle, 
an infinitesimal particle, drops, lime works in, 
hardens and fills the place and thus as particle 
after particle of the wood is wasting, new mat- 



43 



Identity, Individuality Preserved. 

ter as gradually fills in, and so slow is the proc- 
ess, the form of the fibres and tissues of the 
wood are preserved through the same gradual 
process. Not a particle of the wood remains ; it 
is petrified, the entire waste of wood is sub- 
stituted by limestone, or Silica, if a Silicious 
stone. So is it with the scars on my body, at 
my advanced age, formed when a small boy. As 
fast as the old particles of my flesh wasted 
away, the nutriment that has been assimilated 
and absorbed after eating, which has not gone 
to waste and passed out of my system, has taken 
the place of the old, in the scars as well as other 
parts of the body and retains the same form and 
appearance as in the process of petrifying wood 
as described. It must be evident to any one that 
particles in our body waste away, for if it did 
not so waste, the accumulation of flesh on our 
bodies would be something immense. An ele- 
phant would be as a pigmy or a Lilliputian by 
the side of such immense accumulation in the 
course of a series of years, hence continual 
waste from every portion of our body is evident 
and what we eat and the portion of the food 
that is assimilated passes into our system, is con- 
stantly forming new tissues, new muscle, new 
flesh and bone, and in the course of a few years, 
probably about seven years, the old particles of 
our body die or have passed very slowly away 



44 



Identity, Individuality Preserved. 

and the new continue to form and fill the gap, 
and this process is constantly going on. Now 
the fact is significant that as every molecule of 
the body wastes, or returns to the Earth in seven 
or more years, why if the mind or soul or spirit 
is not entirely independent of the body and does 
not preserve its individuality or identity apart 
from matter, why does not consciousness or 
memory, a part and parcel of the mind, waste 
away with the body in seven or more years? 
But on the contrary the octogenarian is more 
conscious of events that occured 70 years ago, 
in childhood and can remember them with 
greater ease than events occurring within the 
space of seven years just passed in his advanced 
age. 

Says Prof. Bain, an eminent savant, "For re- 
ceiving impressions we need the external senses, 
yet the deeper processes, memory, reason, 
imagination, may be pure spirit, beyond and 
apart from all material processes." I have known 
of instances, and perhaps you have, reader, 
where a person has had a leg amputated, when 
after the removal of the leg, he felt that it was 
still attached to his body. In one instance where 
the leg was amputated down stairs and after 
the amputation the leg was carried up stairs and 
placed on the mantel piece by the door, a draft 
of air was felt by the subject operated upon 



45 



Identity, Individuality Preserved. 

down stairs. He told the attendant to move the 
leg away from the draft, as he felt it upon his 
leg. The spirit it will be seen had not entirely- 
left the leg. I knew of another case, a man 
with whom I was well acquainted, who had an 
arm amputated, some 10 or 12 miles from his 
home. It was buried in the ground near by; he 
said the part amputated pained him and re- 
quested that the amputated arm be taken up 
from the ground and deposited again more care- 
fully, and it was done and he felt relieved. 
Hence it will be seen that the spirit is still at- 
tached to the body for a little while, when a 
portion of said body is removed. 



46 



CHAPTER VIII. 

Mans Desire. 

Is the soul, the spirit immortal? Why do we 
ask the question? In the asking alone lies large- 
ly the proof. Do we desire to live beyond? Is 
there a man living in whom this desire is not 
planted, be he Indian, European, American, 
Chinese, or a wild African. The desire to live 
beyond is inherent in every being on the face 
of the Earth. Is this faculty made in vain? It 
is well known in science that the disuse of any 
organ makes it useless and that the disuse of it 
for many generations renders it worthless, and 
it dwindles into nothingness, for nature through- 
out her realms, as any studious observer can 
testify, destroys very gradually any faculty or 
aught else that is not in use. Nature abhors 
anything that is useless, for nothing it makes 
is in vain and we may rest assured that the de- 
sire to live beyond the grave was not made for 
naught, for it is a natural desire and a faculty 
that has not weakened or become lost, for it has 
been inherent in man since his advent upon the 
earth, and has not lost any of its force through 
generation after generation. What would be 
the happiness of today if we gloried not in the 
anticipated joys of tomorrow. We live in the 



47 



Mans Desire. 



future both here and in the hereafter. Every 
race on the face of the earth, no matter how 
ignorant and uncivilized and savage, wor- 
ships some God, something that represents a 
being that controls destiny in the hereafter. 
The low Indian and the barbarian of any clime, 
holds sacred some of the instruments or tools 
that he has in this life and in many cases has 
some of them buried with him when death en- 
sues, that he may see them in the after life. 



48 



CHAPTER IX. 



Certainties of Law and Order in the Universe. 

The entire universe is like a clock, every part 
of it plays in its own orbit, and it matters not 
how inferior the part, for its place is just as 
important in the completion of the great whole. 
If a ball is tossed into the air, it must obey the 
law of gravitation and return, the earth will not 
part with any of its constituents. Nothing 
exists or moves by accident or chance. It 
appears as an accident only through our ignor- 
ance of the law, and that which we call an 
accident is really the faithful operation of 
nature's law. If our carriage breaks it is in 
obedience to the law of gravity, which is con- 
stantly pulling it and its contents to the ground. 
If a ship sinks it is in obedience to the law of 
gravity pulling it down to the bottom of the sea. 
If a house is consumed by fire it is in obedience 
to the law of combustion, the accident was due 
to carelessness and disobedience of nature's 
law. 

The earth moves in its orbit around the 
sun with unvarying exactness. Since the 
dawn of civilization thousands of years ago 
its movements have been studied. It com- 
pletes its circuit around the sun, year after 



49 



Certainties of Law and Order in the Universe. 

year, and has never failed to reach the place 
from whence it began its revolution a year 
before in 365 days, 6 hours, 9 minutes and 10 
seconds and 75-100 of a second. Not a fraction 
of a second has it ever varied, either slower or 
faster, in the thousands of times it has traveled 
around the course, a course extending 550 
millions of miles and it travels 1133 miles a min- 
ute or sixty times faster than a cannon ball 
fired from a cannon's mouth. So it is with all 
the planets in the solar system. Saturn, the 
Ringed Planet, is so far from the sun its path 
or course around him is very long, but with uner- 
ring certainty it makes the revolution in 29 of 
our years and 167 days, no more or less in the 
countless times it completes the circuit. So 
sure and exact are the laws that control all 
bodies in space, astronomers with the utmost 
precision can determine the year, the day and 
the hour, though fifty or a hundred years dis- 
tant, that any celestial phenomena may appear 
in the heavens. 

If there was no universal law regulating the 
stars in space they would be bumping into each 
other and cracking and smashing everything 
they met. The universe and its laws are not a 
chance offering. 

Why then tangle our brains with doubts of 
the hereafter? My trust is unbounded in the 



50 



Certainties of Law and Order in the Universe. 

powers that be, for the same care and exactness 
displayed in the movements of ail bodies in the 
universe is meted out to us, whether we will or 
no. 'Thy will must be done on earth as it is 
done in the heavens." And life, spirit, the soul, 
the very essence of our being is by no means the 
least. It is the kernel of everything and will 
roll on in its own orbit through the dim vista of 
eternity. 

Whether there was or is any conceived plan 
in nature I know not. Nor does anybody else, 
but this I do know, that if there was, it was not 
in my opinion intended that man should be per- 
mitted absolutely to know that life beyond the 
grave is as easily recognized as the sight of any 
tangible object which we are accustomed daily 
to see, for if it were thus permitted, as soon as 
a man or woman was experiencing a sore 
trouble, long continued, suicide would be a com- 
mon occurrence. It certainly does appear that 
this uncertainty is a wise provision, whether 
ordained or planned or not, for notwithstand- 
ing whether wars, earthquakes, floods or 
plagues were intended or not to kill off the 
world's population so that the increase will not 
be too rapid, the mortality would be far in 
excess of the above calamities through suicide 
alone. 



51 



CHAPTER X. 



Life Beyond Demonstrated. 

In my discussion in past chapters on the 
question of immortality I have been led up to 
the possibility of the soul, the spirit, or life that 
has passed out of the body being able to travel 
in space. It cannot stand still, for unrest is the 
law of the universe, and if it can travel I am 
led to think that it may be as easy to travel back 
to earth, as elsewhere in space, if they can only 
learn the law and conditions enabling them to 
communicate with us. It is, I think, almost 
universally believed among those believing in 
immortality, that spirits of our departed friends 
are hovering around us and are cognizant of 
what is going on here and it is not surprising if 
our thoughts should go a step farther in an 
attempt made by our departed friends to com- 
municate in some way with us and hence I must 
be pardoned if attempting to demonstrate more 
clearly a life beyond the grave if I hunt up 
authorities in the past to prove said proposition. 

All through the history of the past for 
thousands of years there have been at various 
periods evidences manifested of the spirits of 
departed beings making their personality evi- 
dent in one form or another to friends upon the 



52 



Life Beyond Demonstrated. 



earth. As for instance the spirits of Moses and 
Elias appeared in their spiritual attire upon 
the Mount and were seen and recognized. The 
witchcraft mania that afflicted the people at va- 
rious times in the past was directed undoubtedly 
by mischievous, undeveloped, departed beings 
who once walked the face of the earth. They 
appeared in England and in Spain and the 
Salem witches in Puritan times were barbarous- 
ly executed. Study and investigate the life prin- 
ciple in man and any unprejudiced mind willing 
to examine all its phases cannot help arriving 
at the conclusion that there is life beyond the 
grave. Takes any one who has never given any 
attention or study of the actual demonstration 
of a life beyond and of a possibility of the 
spirit's return, and seemingly they are 
afraid that if they did they might be 
convinced of its actual possibility. They 
do not possess any grounds for unbelief, 
if they have not the courage or the desire to 
actually know of the possibility and not only 
the possibility but a probability of proof of a 
continuous life beyond and of unmistakable 
evidence through rare conditions of a spirit's 
return in ages past and the present. If as afore- 
said they still refuse to ascertain the truth, they 
must remain in timid ignorance. It does not 
matter how learned a man or woman may be, if 



53 



Life Beyond Demonstrated. 



they have not the courage or desire to investi- 
gate the proposition, their judgment counts for 
nothing. Fifty per cent, of the civilized world 
and not wholly the unlearned, but men and 
women even studiously inclined, yet with 
religious ideas so firmly fixed in their minds, 
that to turn aside to give any attention to new 
thought, appears to them a useless waste of 
time and to some I presume sacrilegious. I 
rarely ever knew of any who had the courage 
of their convictions and were not hide bound to 
popular opinion, who failed to be convinced of 
the fact that the spirit and the soul of man lives 
beyond the grave and under rare conditions can 
commune with some individuals on our planet, 
who are peculiarly organized to receive a 
message. When Christ after the crucifixion 
appeared to doubting Thomas and also to his 
disciples, was that not a return of his spirit? 
Do you, reader, suppose it was his material body 
dropped down from the sky above and pre- 
sented himself to them an earthly body? What 
law is there that would enable anybody to rise 
bodily up to the starry heavens and rest up 
there a day or two suspended in space and then 
drop down bodily upon the earth. There is no 
such law and God has not and will not break 
his own natural law to perform any act that 
would break the harmony and regularity of his 



54 



Life Beyond Demonstrated. 



laws for the sake of showing to humans upon 
this little planet moving harmoniously among 
millions of other planets and gigantic suns in 
their regular orbits — simply to gratify the curi- 
osity and wonder of earth's inhabitants to 
demonstrate an absurd irregularity and an 
impossible feat. No ! as time rolls on Christians 
will grow to realize that it was Christ's spirit 
that returned to doubting Thomas and Mary 
and his disciples and if his spirit returned 2,000 
years ago, the same law regulating its return 
then is the same today. 

Read the highest authorities in Psychical 
Researches, such as Sir Alfred R. Wallace, con- 
temporary with Darwin in the discovery of the 
Progressive path of evolution called Darwinism, 
and one of the greatest scientists of England, 
and of Sir Wm. Crookes, another eminent sci- 
entist of England, one who stands in the front 
rank of scientists of the world, and then the 
great work and publication of Fournier D'Albse 
of France, an eminent investigator of life, both 
in the body and out and beyond, and then again 
read Rev. Minot J. Savage, one of the most 
eminent and popular preachers in Boston and 
New York a few years ago, and see what he 
says in his volume of Psychical Research. And 
if you feel timid or in doubt in consulting a 
clairvoyant or medium about your departed 



55 



Life Beyond Demonstrated. 



friends who are able to come only to a few 
fortunate enough to possess favorable condi- 
tions, go to your public libraries as I have done 
and read the investigations of the philosophers 
above mentioned and hundreds of others who 
have thoroughly investigated "these phenom- 
ena," scientific men who all their lives have 
studied scientific methods and philosophical 
problems, who could discover any crookedness 
or humbuggery, if any existed, in the seances 
they attended. Some of them who went into 
the investigation were very skeptical, believing 
they would detect something illusive and ex- 
plainable in some other way than what was 
claimed, but to their surprise, though discover- 
ing in some exceptional cases, fraud, most of 
their investigations resulted in discovering that 
it was absolutely certain that there was life 
beyond the grave, and that under rare condi- 
tions the spirits did and can communicate with 
friends at times upon the earth. Now I would 
rather trust the researches by those eminent 
men who are constantly investigating scientific, 
physiological and philosophical problems and 
far better able to discover any irregularities 
than myself. Huxley and Tyndall, the eminent 
English scientists, who were avowed material- 
ists, also Haeckel, the German philosopher, 
never as far as I can learn spent any time in 



56 



Life Beyond Demonstrated. 



psychical research. No wonder they were 
materialists. I cannot conceive how anybody 
in like situation can be otherwise, who never 
gave any investigation or attention to the sub- 
ject of Psychical Research. It is certainly to 
my mind the surest channel to an absolute con- 
viction of a continuous life beyond. 



57 



CHAPTER XI. 



Continued Evidences. 

I met a friend not long ago who narrated to 
me an incident which came to him while sitting 
in a circle of investigators. The medium came 
and put his hand on his shoulder and said there 
was a spirit present, whom he once knew and 
said a Miss B (I am not at liberty to give names 
in full) is going to pass on to a higher life before 
many months. She was a lady to whom years 
ago he paid loving attention when a young man. 
The gentleman having the communication was 
an entire stranger to the medium or psychic 
and the rest of the company. He asked where 
she was living and answered she was then living 
in Portland, Me., and the name of the one com- 
municating the message was given whom he 
formerly knew, both of whom he had not 
thought of for years. In about a year and a 
half after this event, in looking over the deaths 
in the daily paper, he saw the name of his friend 
among the deceased. This was not the reading 
of his mind for they were the farthest from his 
thoughts. 

Rev. Mr. Savage has published in his book 
of Psychical Researches some very striking 
communications from the higher life. Here is 



58 



Continued 'Evidences. 



one that occurs to me. January 18, 1884, there 
was a wreck of a steamer named City of 
Columbus off Gay Head, Martha's Vineyard. A 
friend of Mr. Savage had an aunt on board who 
was among the missing and it was supposed she 
was drowned. Finally one of the family, who 
was in the habit of frequenting a psychic or 
medium doctor for treatment, spoke of the 
drowned friend. The psychic said she would 
try and see if she could get a communication for 
him and to their surprise she did. The departed 
spirit told them that she did not drown on the 
wrecked steamer, or rather that drowning was 
not the cause of her death, but that when the 
accident occurred, a piece of timber struck her 
head and killed her and she sank with the rest 
on board. 

Immediately after the wreck her friends 
endeavored to find her body upon the beach. 
At first they were unsuccessful, but at last they 
succeeded in finding it and found that just as 
the medium had stated, she did not die from 
drowning but found her skull was broken and 
occasioned by being hit by a piece of broken 
timber just as the departed spirit of the aunt 
described. 

Here is a case where they did not read the 
mind of the sitter. Another test Rev. Mr. 
Savage narrates was related to him by personal 



59 



Continued Evidences. 



friends and relations of his. The mother of 
two boys went visiting in an adjoining town for 
the day and when it was about time for her to 
return home on the train the boys thought they 
would go to the station and see their mother 
home, but that was the last seen of them alive. 
When the mother reached home she inquired 
for the boys and she was told that they went up 
to the station to meet her and that was all they 
knew about it; but as they failed to get home, 
search was made for them. The following day 
the neighbors spent the day in search and 
finally some of them suggested to search the 
pond near by and grappling irons were obtained 
and after some hours of searching the pond 
their bodies could not be found. 

Finally a sympathetic neighbor called upon 
her and although she took no stock, generally 
speaking, in mediums, neither did the mother 
(both being evangelical church goers). She 
asked the mother why, as a last resort, she 
didn't consult a medium in Boston. Hence the 
mother asked the kind neighbor if she wouldn't 
go to the city and consult one. She replied she 
hated to, but finally consented. She didn't 
know where to go as she knew nothing about 
the whereabouts of any medium. Hearing 
about the Banner of Light, a prominent Spirit- 
ualist paper published in Boston, she inquired 



60 



Continued Evidences. 



of the managers if they could direct her to a 
good medium, and they did and she went to two, 
but each was engaged and could not sit for her. 
She finally was given the address of another one 
and at last secured a sitting. The medium was 
a complete stranger to her and had never visited 
the town from which she came. She did not 
even tell her what she wanted to find out and 
after a while the medium told her that she saw 
the boys drowned in a pond in the town where 
the mother lived and that they would be found 
in the pond. The neighbor told her that could 
not be for the pond had been dragged and no 
bodies found. "Ah!" the medium replied, "they 
did not search in the right place!" And then 
she described to the neighbor how the thing 
happened. She said they started to the station 
to meet their mother and as they had some spare 
time they saw a fire close to the pond and were 
attracted to it and near the pond was a boat 
house with a hole in one side of it, so they pulled 
the boat out and placed it in the pond to enjoy 
a little row. It was a very small boat and while 
one of the boys was standing up the boat cap- 
sized and both went down and were drowned. 
She told her they would not be found in the 
main part of the pond, but a little way from 
the boat house and that the boat was painted 
black. The neighbor returned home and still 



61 



Continued Evidences. 



incredulous, she told the mother and also the 
searchers, what she was told. They went to 
the place and after searching the spot described 
near the boat house they found the bodies of the 
two boys and noticed that the boat house had 
a hole in it, large enough to pull the boat out, 
which was painted black, all just as the medium 
described. 

At the close of the interview, the neighbor 
asked the psychist or medium from what source 
she obtained her claimed information and she 
replied from the departed spirit of the boy's 
father who was killed in battle. Here was no 
mind reading it will be observed, for the neigh- 
bor who consulted the psychic knew nothing 
about the boat house or the boat. 

Rev. Mr. Savage gives another interesting and 
convincing incident. He was acquainted with 
parties connected with the incident and knew it 
to be true. A young lady was playing on her 
piano alone in the room except a pet, a little 
dog which was sitting in a chair beside her. 
The dog was never whipped, as he was a pet 
and had no fear of his mistress. AH at once it 
began to growl at something he saw and the girl 
noticed that he was trembling and in a moment 
as she looked about her to see what troubled the 
dog, she saw a mist in the middle of the room, 
and it gradually grew into two or three forms, 



62 



Continued Evidences. 



with head and shoulders visible and a shroud 
seen to cover the rest of the bodies, and two 
of the forms she recognized as an aunt who had 
died years ago and her grandmother who had 
long ago deceased. The dog became so fright- 
ened at the appearance of these he skulked 
under the sofa and would not come out after 
repeated calls of his mistress. At last she was 
obliged to move the sofa and pick up the trem- 
bling pet. The spirit forms gradually dissolved 
and disappeared. If the mistress had seen the 
spirit figures first and had shown any fear it 
might reasonably be said that her fear was con- 
tagious and that the dog was frightened because 
she was, but the dog was the first discoverer 
and his mistress saw and recognized her aunt 
who had passed away years before, only after 
the growl of the dog. 

Sir William Crookes, the eminent English 
scientist before mentioned, whose word among 
men of science is law, carefully conducted ex- 
periments in material manifestations by a 
medium named Miss Cook, controlled by a spirit 
named Katie, which he reported to scientific 
societies of which he was a leading member. 
One seance he reported was a sitting with Miss 
Cook who was controlled by the spirit Katie, 
who allowed him to test the presence of Katie's 
spiritual form, while manifesting her presence 



63 



Continued Evidences. 



in his company at the circle. He felt of the 
form of spirit Katie and was convinced by care- 
ful observations that it was not the body of the 
psychic or medium Miss Cook. Afterwards the 
medium was behind the curtain in the library 
and the spirit Katie who was influencing her 
told Sir Crookes to come into her presence and 
take his phosphorous lamp and lift up the medi- 
um's head and body which had dropped un- 
consciously towards the floor. The medium 
was attired (he saw) in a velvet dress she wore 
heretofore and turning to the spirit form of 
Katie he saw her standing separately one side 
by herself and draped in a white robe. He 
turned the light again upon spirit Katie and 
there she stood apart from the prostrate and 
unconscious form of the psychic, Miss Cook. The 
spirit form was some four or five inches taller 
than the medium. Now this was not a case of 
a medium being shut up in a cabinet and in the 
dark as is usual, but right in the open, in the 
library with a phosphorescent light in Sir 
Crookes' hand he detected the medium alone, 
but the spirit that controlled her was standing 
one side, separate and apart and his seeing the 
spirit was not visionary for it allowed him to 
put his hands upon her, to establish the fact that 
it was Katie's spirit and not the body of the 
medium Cook or anybody else. 



64 



Continued Evidences. 



I could give instances of spirit communication 
authenticated by Sir Alfred R. Wallace, the 
eminent scientist before mentioned, and other 
eminent scientific investigators, but time and 
space will not allow. 

I will, however, give one more, narrated to me 
by my brother-in-law, an incident he knew per- 
sonally about. A neighbor of his and one but 
a little way from my own home at Marshfield 
Hills, Mass., had a brother who had left home 
suddenly many years before and had not been 
heard from. After some years of anxiety con- 
cerning his mysterious absence, the brother 
thought he would consult a psychic or medium 
and during a sitting with Mr. Samuel Grover 
of Boston, a famous medium, years ago, a mes- 
sage came from a departed spirit and friend of 
the absent one and said that the brother was in 
San Francisco, Cal., in a hospital; that long 
before in some accident his head was struck in 
some way and he was rendered unconscious. He 
was taken to a hospital. He lost his memory 
so that he could not inform his attendants where 
he came from and had no idea where his rela- 
tives lived. Even his own name he forgot. His 
relative wrote to San Francisco and to the hos- 
pital where the medium said he could be found 
and had a reply that a person meeting the 
description was still there, they thought. The 



65 



Continued Evidences. 



brother immediately started across the conti- 
nent and arrived at said hospital and found the 
brother just as the medium had stated and 
brought him at once to his lost home. 

Now this was a very rare case. It wouldn't 
occur once in a thousand times where one if he 
or she went to get a like message could be as 
successful. It requires a condition in a given 
medium or departed spirit that is not an every 
day occurrence, a condition that is not easily 
met, but if we are after a conviction or belief 
that the soul is immortal and that in after life 
there is a possibility to commune with the earth, 
why one fact is as good as a thousand whether 
it comes to us or to somebody else we know 
about, one of undoubted authority in whom we 
have confidence. 

It is a mistake to accept the common re- 
mark constantly made, that if our departed 
friends have anything to say let them say it 
directly to us. One might as well say if we 
have friends in California and they desire to 
talk to us by telephone let them telephone direct 
to us and not bother us by going to somebody's 
telephone receiver to get the message. No, you 
must comply with the conditions and go to the 
instrument no matter how much trouble it may 
cause you if you want to get a message and one 
must know that it is a thousand times more dif- 



66 



Continued Evidences. 



ficult to get a message from the spirit world. 
It may come in time, just the same as it took a 
million of years or more since the advent of 
man upon our planet, to discover a way to com- 
mune and talk one with another at any distance 
apart by telegraph and telephone or wireless 
telegraph and it is only within a month or two 
notwithstanding the telephone has been in oper- 
ation two or three decades, that a message 
could be sent by telephone direct from Boston 
to San Francisco, from the Atlantic across the 
continent to the Pacific, a distance of about 
3,500 miles, and we anticipate that the facilities 
for communication between the spirit world and 
our own will be realized as certainly as time 
rolls on. It may take a century or several cen- 
turies to accomplish it, but it is a fact that it 
has been demonstrated once or twice or many 
times. It has taken a million of years or more 
for the mind of man to be able to talk and com- 
municate with his fellow man miles apart. We 
have just begun. It has taken all these years to 
find the possibilities of electricity and here we 
expect that within the little time of a century in 
comparison we can be able to achieve another 
possibility in reaching by electric current the 
other world, which here has taken centuries 
upon centuries to fathom the possibilities upon 
the earth. Notwithstanding I have not been 



67 



Continued Evidences. 



fortunate enough to receive messages personally 
myself, as long as the law of communication 
between the two worlds has been established, 
even if only in one instance, that is enough to 
know that I live again which pays me tenfold 
for the search and investigation and the happi- 
ness realized during my sojourn on the earth. 
And electricity in time will be the key to unlock 
the mystery of a thousand years. 

And then again is it reasonable to suppose 
that spirits of departed friends are floating 
around the earth waiting for a chance at the 
open door to send a message to you? No; they 
have not developed to any degree if they are 
spending their time looking out for a chance to 
speak with you, for they know it is not many 
years at the most, measured by eternity, that 
you, gentle reader, will be numbered among 
them ; and then again have you made any effort 
to visit a trustworthy medium (and I am free 
to say they are not all trustworthy) and search 
for an opportunity to get messages from your 
spirit friends? Even if you have and failed in 
your first and second call, persevere and call 
again and again until you succeed. 

As Rev. Mr. Savage says, you must be patient 
and wait until conditions are right. The con- 
ditions for telegraphing are very exact, the 
wires must be of a certain material; they will 



68 



Continued Evidences. 



not work if they are a non-conductor. You 
cannot get a communication along the line of a 
board fence, for wood is a poor conductor of 
electricity, neither can you get communica- 
tions from departed spirits through a per- 
son who is not especially organized, pecu- 
liarly organized for the reception and also 
the power to transmit and make manifest 
the message that the departed desires to make 
known. Such an organism is a rarity, as rare 
as for a mesmerizer or hypnotist to get a sub- 
ject, one out of a thousand to do his bidding, as 
it requires a particular organism to operate and 
be operated upon. It may be that magnetic or 
electrical conditions are in some way requisite 
for communications between the two worlds. 

One of the greatest obstacles to the accept- 
ance and dissemination of this hypothesis is the 
deceit and humbuggery practiced by some 
Charlatans, styling themselves mediums and 
clairvoyants. Christianity should not be 
shunned and dropped because there are many 
hypocrites who profess Christianity and follow 
false and dishonest acts in its name and are 
not great enough to withstand the many tempta- 
tions that beset them. When a medium is ex- 
posed for humbuggery the exposure is heralded 
a thousand fold more far reaching than a gen- 
uine communication received from the spirit 



69 



Continued Evidences. 



world. Somehow we as a people listen and 
catch more eagerly the wrong doings, the frauds 
of man, than the pure, upright practices of our 
fellows. 

Pursue the daily newspaper and you will find 
a dozen mentionings of wrongs perpetrated on 
the other fellow where you find one speaking of 
a noble, righteous act. No, let us sift the chaff 
from the mass and search for the good and pure 
and not condemn the whole because of the 
wrong practices of the few. 

The truth will be made manifest if you exer- 
cise patience and perseverance mentally as well 
as physically and investigate with a truthful 
and earnest desire to learn more and more of a 
continuous life. The opposition to investigation 
is peculiarly inexplicable, for I cannot imagine 
how one does not want to be assured of a here- 
after through any sort of evidence that can be 
presented. What matters it how you get it as 
long as you get it. The majority appear to 
fight it, as though it was sacrilegious. What is 
there sacrilegious about a desire to investigate 
a life hereafter. It doesn't matter whether the 
spirit can return or not; all the better if it can 
return, is it not? If they can you must feel 
pretty well convinced that life is continuous. 
You will probably believe what the Bible says 
that Moses' and Elias' spirits appeared on the 



70 



Continued Evidences. 



Mount — and also that Christ appeared to the 
doubting Thomas and his disciples after he was 
crucified and if they could appear and com- 
municate with this world two and three thou* 
sand years ago, will not the same law allow 
others under similar conditions to communicate 
now. "God is no respecter of persons" as long 
as he or she behaves himself. I want to believe 
in a hereafter. I will do any honorable thing 
to become assured of it, and what proof have I 
unless I believe the evidence offered me by the 
highest authority, both in ages past and present 
that certain departed beings once living here 
at certain times have returned. What a happy 
thought to be assured of a life beyond the grave. 



71 



CHAPTER XII. 



Eternalism and Eternalists. 

If there exists a prejudice with some against 
the name of Spiritualism and Spiritualists, (the 
same as there is against the name "Socialists," 
which by some extremists is made distasteful) 
substitute another term, and perhaps by so 
doing it would embrace a larger scope, such as 
"Eternalism." That term not only includes the 
belief of a life beyond, the hereafter, a world 
without end, but also that word in compliance 
with Webster's definition, signifies no begin- 
ning. "Eternalism," which is the kernel of my 
Thesis, from beginning to end in these pages of 
my book, and the believers in "Eternalism," 
which stands for no beginning to existence, life, 
or the Universe, should properly be called 
"Eternalists." It is possible when I pass to the 
life beyond that I should choose to visit other 
planets inhabited, instead of returning to our 
planet. I do not know why they picture wings 
upon an Angel in the flights of a spirit, for 
wings denote a material body, while a departed 
soul is spiritual and needs no wings floating in 
space. 

The term "Eternalists" would emphasize the 
opposite of Materialists, who do not believe in 



72 



EternaUsm and Eternalists. 

a continuous life beyond, and make it more dis- 
tinctive of a continuous life and also it would 
emphasize the distinction between the words 
Spiritualist and Eternalist, as the former refers 
to the life beyond and return only, while as 
aforesaid "Eternalist" signifies not only a con- 
tinuous life hereafter, but it stands for Eternity 
in no beginning as well as no ending to the life 
and soul of beings. Therefore I am an "Eter- 
nalist," a believer in "Eternalism." 



73 



CHAPTER XIII. 

Possibilities of Electrical Communications. 

The future possibilities of Electricity are be- 
yond the knowledge of man. A man with 
courage enough to prophesy a century ago the 
present marvelous working of electricity as ap- 
plied to the varied uses of man, would have 
been considered a visionary, rattle-brained dare 
devil and the same may be true of me today, if 
I dare a prophesy that a thousand of years dis- 
tant, if not before, it would be possible to tele- 
graph or telephone to the moon some 239,000 
miles distant, if conditions were right, that is if 
there were inhabitants there. But as there is 
not, as generally agreed by most astronomers, 
there would be no one at the other end to re- 
ceive the current and return it, for all tele- 
graphic or telephone messages must have at the 
further end a receiver to make the circuit com- 
plete, as is also illustrated by the wireless. But 
a message to the Planet Mars would meet with 
conditions possible, for it has been demonstrated 
by astronomers, that the planet is inhabited, — 
for instance canals have been discovered paral- 
lel to each other, showing that living beings 
must have placed them there. They may be 
inhabitants formed like men and may not. 



74 



Possibilities of Electrical Communications. 

Snow as seen at the poles make it possible that 
water is on that globe, which is absent on the 
Moon, and as water is an important factor to 
support life, we have the right to expect beings, 
possibly men, existing there. If such is the 
case, I do not hesitate to predict that in the 
distant future wireless telegraphy may be had 
with the Martians. 

So it may be possible in the spirit world that 
communications may be had between our world 
and theirs by electrical, magnetic manipulations 
in some way yet undiscovered and that possibly 
some genius of an Edison may in the future 
solve the problem how and by what method or 
formula for spirit rappings, or other material 
manifestations, or written or verbal messages 
are or can be and will be sent to the Earth, 
although under rare and special psychical con- 
ditions not yet generally understood. 

It has been discovered through an instrument 
called the Spectroscope that our sister Planets 
contain the same properties of matter that our 
Earth possesses, Iron, Soda, Sulphur, Alumina, 
Copper, Silver and every known substance or- 
dinarily found upon our Planet and even the 
fixed stars, which are simply suns like our own, 
through said spectroscope, like substances 
have been found, so that it is not so wild 
a prediction as it would at first seem, for 



75 



Possibilities of Electrical Communications. 

if like conditions exist upon our sister 
planet as upon our own it is possible that in a 
cycle of years they can be controlled through 
such electrical possibilities as have startled the 
world by Edison's great electrical discoveries 
in the past. On some of our Planets however, 
communications passing between us cannot be 
possible for perhaps millions of years, because 
these planets, such as Jupiter, Saturn, and 
possibly Uranus and Neptune have not suffi- 
ciently matured and solidified to admit as far as 
our earthy experience goes to develop living 
beings upon their surfaces, for telescopic re- 
searches so far cannot reveal anything more 
than a gaseous, vapory, incandescent, fiery mass, 
and our earthly knowledge cannot comprehend 
the existence of life upon those planets and 
therefore no communication is possible. Hence 
we can conceive it probable that communica- 
tions through electrical conditions may pass be- 
tween this and the spiritual world beyond, for 
at the other end, there are beings to receive the 
current and make a return to people upon the 
Earth possible. 



76 



CHAPTER XIV. 

Conditions of Life in the World Beyond. 

Now the question arises what are the con- 
ditions and movements of departed spirits and 
souls in the future life. Of course one's opinion 
must be a matter of more or less speculation, 
but nevertheless there are some grounds per- 
haps for supposing certain states of existence 
beyond. 

The atmosphere surrounding the Earth is esti- 
mated by some scientists to be some 45 miles 
high. I see no reason why it should not be 100 
miles or a thousand as to that matter, for there 
should be no defined limit to the atmosphere. To 
be sure it would become pretty well attenuated 
at a hundred miles and considerably more so a 
thousand miles high, for space is not supposed 
to be a vacuum, in which nothing exists, but a 
substance does exist as ether. All space must be 
filled with this unrecognizable, invisible mass. 

Now it is perhaps possible, aye probable, that 
recent departed spirits hover around the Earth 
for a time, how long cannot be estimated, but 
probably as long as the attractions upon the 
Earth draw them to it. It is not reasonable to 
suppose however that after a certain period they 
will hover around the Earth, for they have 



77 



Conditions of Life in the World Beyond. 

friends and ancestors who have passed beyond 
years before, and just as dear to them as those 
left behind and who have outgrown the attrac- 
tions of Earth, and have advanced farther in 
space to mingle with their predecessors. We 
use the word "up," and "higher up," but there is 
no such thing as up or down outside of a planet. 
Our planet is moving in space and it is just as 
much down or up in one place or position as 
another. We get used to saying "down," be- 
cause the gravity of all bodies on the Earth is 
pulling everything upon it towards the center. 

The Spiritual body no doubt is more or less 
ponderable. It likely has weight, but very 
slight, invisible, ethereal, and advances to 
higher or broader realms as desire and con- 
ditions dictate. Our most abundant gas, 
Oxygen, is invisible, but it is a substance. It 
may be said, how does the spirit materialize 
upon the Earth under these conditions? It is 
supposed by some investigators that it draws 
matter to some extent from the medium and 
matter upon the Earth. Materializing mediums 
have been known to become thoroughly ex- 
hausted by the spirit communicating, drawing 
particles from their body, and have been seen 
to become a trifle emaciated after the spirit 
form had completed the manifestation. The 
latter seem to have the power momentarily of 



78 



Conditions of Life in the World Beyond. 

attracting or absorbing from the psychic or 
medium, also earthy matter in the vicinity, in 
sufficient quantity to personate a human form. 

Spirits undoubtedly travel in space rapidly. 
I think my ambition beyond, after I became suf- 
ficiently weaned from the Earth and spiritual- 
ized and advanced to enter a higher sphere, 
would be to visit the planets and other moving 
objects in space, that is to say if planets were 
habitable. 

Mars will be an interesting planet to approach 
and our moon, the other side of which has never 
been visible to the inhabitants of the Earth, for 
only one side of it is turned towards us in its 
revolution about our planet. It would be inter- 
esting to visit the unseen portion of the Satellite. 
There is Saturn the ringed planet, with a ring of 
innumerable stars around it, and eight moons 
revolving around it. What a magnificent sight 
to view those rings and moons in their re- 
splendent grandeur. Having been a student of 
Astronomy for some years such stellar objects 
in space, including the rapidly travelling 
comets speeding periodically around the Sun, 
would be grand to view. 

I have been some time preparing for the be- 
yond, being thus advanced in years, studying 
those subjects that in my point of view will in- 
terest me in that life. Astronomical features 



79 



Conditions of Life in the World Beyond. 

and the problem of life have occupied my atten- 
tion quite a little, and the more advanced in 
thought one becomes in this life, the higher his 
position in the spheres above and more rapidly 
will he be able to adapt himself to some voca- 
tion suited to his new sphere of action. I do not 
cherish a desire to be floating around the earth 
when I quit this life longer than the period of 
time required for my advancement and equip- 
ment spiritually for higher spheres. I am some- 
what of the opinion of a friend of mine, who 
some years ago, in discussing the future said, 
"Well I have had a pretty good time while 
sojourning in this life, and if God has got any- 
thing better in the world beyond, bring it on, 
that's all." I am content, it can't be anything 
but just and right, and as death is inevitable 
why worry or dread the separation? As the say- 
ing is "death and taxes are inevitable." 

Death is a very wise and beneficent institution 
in nature. What a world this would be if there 
were no death ! Every spot on the earth would 
not only be inhabited, but we would be piled 
upon each other miles high in the course of ages, 
hence why dread the event? We should thank 
the Powers that be, God, for this wise provision 
in the economy of nature. I do not consider 
there will be any great change in the transition 
from this world to the next. As the tree in- 



80 



Conditions of Life in the World Beyond. 

clineth so will we grow, both here and here- 
after. If one has murder in his heart here, his 
soul will be burdened with it there. If he is a 
thief here, he will be filled with a desire to 
take advantage of his neighbor beyond. If he 
is untrustworthy and selfish here he will be 
there. No pardon will be vouchsafed to him 
there more than here for his shortcomings. No 
eleventh hour forgiveness will be meted to him 
as he crosses the threshold of eternity. This 
life is given to the wayfarer upon the earth to 
make the best use of it and if he fails he must 
suffer for the bad use of the opportunity vouch- 
safed him. He must work out his salvation by 
good works, both here and hereafter — and the 
sooner we have grown broad enough to realize 
that fact, the sooner will we become better 
fitted for this world and better fitted for the 
new experience beyond, and that, in my opinion, 
is the only key to the much talked of salvation. 
A bad conscience cannot be purified in the 
twinkling of an eye. Nor can anybody's word 
or guarantee do it; the door of purification or 
salvation cannot be passed except through the 
office of good works both here and beyond. 
When that is done, no matter to what sect you 
may belong, advancement and salvation is 
secure and not till then. 



81 



CHAPTER XV. 



Animal Life in the Hereafter. 

The question may now arise do animals be- 
low the species of man live beyond the grave? 
Let us again examine life, what is it? Is it not 
part and parcel of spirit and soul and separate 
from the material body? Is there any absolute 
distinction between the terms life, spirit, soul 
and mind? I have put this proposition to several 
great thinkers, eminent clergymen and states- 
men, liberal in their religious views, who agree 
with me, that there is not practically any dis- 
tinction between them. I am well aware that 
Catholicism and the evangelical, conservative 
portion of the community believe there is a dis- 
tinction, and claim that the moral propensities 
are distinct and separate from the divine or 
religious make-up. In other words they believe 
that a good moral life don't count if you fail to 
experience religion as they term it. Let us see 
what the 1 moral nature of man is. Is it not part 
and parcel of the mind and what is his religious 
and devotional propensity but a part and parcel 
of the mind? Can you imagine a man's moral 
function or his religious bent apart from the 
mind? Man has but two divisions in his make- 
up, and that is his material, earthy body and 
his mind, of which spirit, life, soul is a compo- 



82 



Animal Life in the Hereafter. 

nent part of it and cannot exist separately from 
it. The function of the mind is to guide and 
regulate the actions and doings of the body. 

I have heard some evangelical clergymen and 
laymen state that it matters not how moral, how 
good a life one may lead, if one does not experi- 
ence religion and be converted to Christ, re- 
gardless of any amount of worthy, noble deeds 
in his moral life, he cannot be saved, salvation 
is not for him. 

The brain is an inseparable part of the ma- 
terial body, the machine through which the 
mind operates and makes itself manifest. If 
then the moral and religious nature of man is 
simply a manifestation of the mind, differing in 
degree only as to the point of view one takes of 
it, it must be one and indivisible. Is the soul of 
man, as believed by some in olden time, located 
in the heart? Or is it a part of the life, life im- 
mortal, the spirit and simply a property, a mani- 
festation of the mind. Now I have been leading 
up in my argument to the proposition, resolved 
into this, that the life, spirit, soul and the mind 
are one and the same thing, one and insepara- 
ble, no matter whether it is contained in man, 
a dog, a cat, an elephant, a horse or an ape, it is 
all one and the same thing, differing only in 
degree. Reason is the deliberate exercise of 
the mind, of thought. 



83 



Animal Life in the Hereafter. 

Instinct is the hereditary transmission of a 
fixed habit, the latter is inherent in man as in 
the brute. Some men are moved more by in- 
stinct than reason. Man is ushered into exist- 
ence a helpless, thoughtless babe and with the 
instinct of a brute nurses as readily as a pup 
or calf. Years pass by and it develops as he 
passes into manhood, he goes to the polls, asks 
no questions, reasons not with himself or any- 
body else, but mechanically and instinctively 
votes with the party that his papa and his great 
grandpapa voted. He attends church and pays 
liberally to its support and should he be asked 
why he attends this special church he may per- 
haps be able to repeat the creed, further than 
that he knows nothing; sufficient is it for him 
that his father, his great grandfather and the 
whole line of ancestors attended the same 
church, be it Roman Catholic, Methodist or 
Universalist. To him it is simply mechanical, in- 
stinctive, an hereditary custom or habit that 
prompts his attendance to his place of worship, 
not reason, hence instinct is a part and parcel 
of man's make up, as with animals, and reason 
is a part of the animal's function, as in man, 
but of course in a far less degree. Many in- 
stances one can give of a dog, a cat, an 
elephant, a monkey, a horse and many other 
species of animals, who have time and again 



84 



Animal Life in the Hereafter. 

shown reason in their movement on certain 
occasions where hesitation in a choice of certain 
acts outside of their instinctive propensities 
and where reason must be exercised to gain the 
object or result for which they were in search. 
As for instance, take a very common example 
of a dog in search of his master, who perchance 
left home an hour or so before, and when the 
dog comes to a fork in two roads, he is puzzled 
which of the two roads to take, and thinking 
a minute or two, he takes the one he thinks his 
master has taken. Now the dog reasons as much 
as a man, in determining the road to take. It 
certainly is not instinct, for if the latter, he 
would not have hesitated but would have 
passed right along. Nearly all animals have 
brains, some more than others and this in- 
equality is quite conspicuous in man. In some 
of the lower animals the brains are very 
minute and not confined to the head, but are 
scattered along the length of their body in two 
or three ganglions or bunches. The very 
lowest order of animals have no brains visible 
and from them we see not the slightest mani- 
festation of thought, either instinct or reason, 
just what we might expect in the absence of 
brains. But as we advance higher in the scale 
of life, brains develop. The horse for example 
is the noblest of all animals and to deny him 



85 



Animal Life in the Hereafter. 

the power of thought is an insult to his unde- 
niable intelligence. Brains we find in animals 
no higher than insects and here we expect to 
find the manifestation of thought and reason 
just in proportion to the quantity and quality 
o:! brain mass, and this we find in the ant and 
bee. The ants form a colony and engage in 
battle, one colony with another in the struggle 
for supremacy, the same as man. The bees dis- 
play remarkable intelligence in all their move- 
ments. This I am aware is commonly called 
instinct, but as I have before explained it is 
an hereditary habit passed down from one 
generation to another, same as I also instanced 
in some of the habits of man, founded no doubt 
way back by its progenitor on the line of reason- 
ing out its mode of procedure, and finally 
through generation after generation it became 
a fixed habit, so called instinct. A fox exhibits 
a deal of thought when caught in a trap and 
feigns death, but escapes when released. The 
size of the brain in animals however, does not 
always indicate the capacity of thought, or 
amount of intelligence, for that depends largely 
on the convolutions of the brain as well as the 
amount of gray matter therein. It is the com- 
plexity, the windings of the brain as well as the 
amount of the gray matter in the cerebrum or 
the frontal portion of the brain, that is required 



86 



Animal Life in the Hereafter. 

and that is why the intelligence in man far sur- 
passes a large brain in volume in some of the 
high order of animals. The quadramana pre- 
sent the nearest approach to man, but their 
brain is much inferior in quality and convolu- 
tions. 

In descending the scale of mammalia there 
may be observed a gradual simplification in 
the general structure of the brain. Among all 
the birds, there is none with which I am 
acquainted in which the brain is so proportion- 
ally large as in the parrot tribe. Their edu- 
cability as is shown in their prompt exercise 
of thought, is familiar to every one ; while the 
large domestic turkey, having a brain scarcely 
half the proportional size, exhibits but little in- 
telligence. The very small size of the cere- 
brum, the seat of intelligence, in reptiles and 
fishes presents but feeble indications of intelli- 
gence. The shark among fishes has the largest 
cerebrum proportionally, and the superior in- 
telligence is well known to those who have had 
the opportunity^ of observing their habits and 
it is interesting to note that their brain occa- 
sionally presents an appearance of rudimentary 
convolutions. 

The attachment of the dog, cat and horse 
or elephant is evidently of a much higher order 
than that of the more inferior animals and in- 



87 



Animal Life in the Hereafter. 

volves a much larger number of convolutions, 
and their actions are evidently in many in- 
stances the result of a complex train of reason- 
ing, different in no essential respect from that 
which man would perform in similar circum- 
stances. Says Dr. Carpenter, an eminent Eng- 
lish Scientist, "the epithet commonly applied 
to animals does not express the whole truth, 
for their mental processes are of the same kind 
with those of man, differing only in degree. " 

The quality of the brain has more to do with 
the development of thought or reason than 
quantity, whether in man or beast. 

We see this exemplified in man, some possess 
large heads and a large quantity of brain mass, 
but fewer convolutions and a small amount of 
grey matter and their mind develops but little 
thought or reason. Take the ant, if the brain 
filled the entire portion of the head, the size 
would not be larger than the head of an ordin- 
ary pin, and the bee but a little larger, and what 
a wonderful amount of intelligence is displayed 
in so small a space. If as much was exhibited 
in man in proportion to the size of his massive 
brain, vastly greater minds and works should 
we witness than in past centuries. The time 
was when man was much lower in the scale of 
life, than at present, The only tools the primi- 
tive or pre-historic man possessed were made 



38 



Animal Life in the Hereafter. 

of stone. Indians are living today who use 
nothing but stone implements. In my travels 
on the Pacific Coast in 1874 I met a tribe of 
Indians and joined them in their feast. Nothing 
but heated stones and willow baskets and 
fagots were used to cook their food. Nothing 
but hands in place of knives, forks and spoons 
were used to eat their food, and acorn soup 
eaten with their fingers. Their food was mostly 
uncooked. Grasshoppers uncooked were 
counted choice morsels at their feasts. Worms 
were dug out of the bark of the trees and 
greedily devoured, and these we call men, and 
so they are, but little in advance of some in- 
telligent beasts or some of the apes. If these 
tribes of men are so low in our own time how 
much lower must have been the primitive or 
pre-historic men in ages and ages past. 

We speak of this to show that there is not 
so very wide a dilference between the lowest 
races of men and the highest order of animals. 
It is true that animals in general cannot talk, 
and yet when one listens to the matchless 
eloquence of a Beecher or Gladstone, which 
lifts the very soul of man into Unity with God, 
and turns to the wild Australian who cannot 
count four in his own language and to the wild 
men of Borneo, whose only answer to your logic 
is a grunt, one is compelled to the conclusion 



89 



Animal Life in the Hereafter. 

that speech or the talk of the parrot and the 
intelligent answers often given, is not so far 
below the lowest order of men, as the latter 
is below the silvery tongued orator of a Cicero 
or Demosthenes. It is because of the false pre- 
vailing notion that the dumb animals possess 
no feelings common with man that I speak of 
them. We know that they do possess it, and we 
cannot dispossess ourself of the belief that 
animals live beyond the grave. Why should 
they not. Man's existence was evolved through 
countless generations from them and through 
them. We are but a step beyond them. They 
cannot talk, but it would be better for some men 
if they could not. They undoubtedly have a 
language among themselves in their own par- 
ticular species. It is simply a matter of the con- 
struction of man's vocal organs, that enables 
him to talk. A deaf and dumb man is deprived 
of these organs, the same as a dog or cat, but 
his mind, his intellect, is just as active ; and so it 
is with the brute, it cannot talk in our language, 
but that does not prevent its intelligence acting 
for its own benefit, and reasoning in its own 
way for its wants. A quadruped walks upon 
all fours, but the highest species of animals, 
the Ape, the Gorilla and the Chimpanzee can 
walk upright on their two legs as man. So can 
the bear. His feet and legs are constructed 



90 



Animal Life in the Hereafter. 

similar to the feet of man, only broader. I have 
witnessed the tracks of a bear in the Sierra 
Nevada Mts. and you can scarcely tell them 
from the feet of man, except being broader, 
hence the more advanced construction of man 
in his organism furnishes no grounds of belief 
that he is to be alone favored with a continuous 
life, to the neglect of the rest of the animal 
kingdom. 

We can see no reason why everything sus- 
taining life should not be continuous after the 
matter comprising their structure dies and de- 
composes. The lower the organism of any 
living thing, the lower the plane of existence in 
the life beyond ; and so it is with man, the lower 
his plane of existence in his mental and spiritual 
makeup here, the lower will be his sphere in 
the life beyond. We are convinced there are 
spheres in the hereafter for mankind and 
animal kind. The higher and purer a man lives 
here in his mental and spiritual experiences, the 
higher will be his sphere beyond, and higher 
in the realms of space. The uncivilized, the 
thoughtless beings of mankind, must of neces- 
sity dwell in lower spheres hereafter, nearer to 
earth to which they are more attracted and not 
outgrown. They would not be happy in a 
higher sphere for like attracts like and so with 
the quadruped form of life, they cannot rise 



91 



Animal Life in ike Hereafter. 

much above the earth and the same is true with 
all species of animal life. The incident narrated 
in a previous Chapter, on spirit manifestation, 
of the dog showing fear, when in company with 
his mistress in the parlor, at the sudden ap- 
pearance of spirit forms in materialized robes, 
appears to me a proof of the spirit and mind 
of the dog recognizing another spirit departed, 
and if the dog had no spirit he certainly could 
not recognize another, any more than a dead 
log of wood, or than an oyster, lacking intel- 
ligence. 



92 



CHAPTER XVI. 



Continuity of Plant Life. 

It may be said if all animals are immortal 
and all forms of life are continued beyond, what 
will you do with plant life? I can see no reason 
why plants, the life that causes the plant to 
grow and thrive is not continued in the life be- 
yond, just as real as the life of a human or the 
lowest species of animal life. The covering, 
the earth form which holds the spirit, the life 
of all nature including the human, the lowest 
form of animal to the highest, which causes all 
forms to grow and move and have a being, 
simply drops its garment at what we call death, 
and appears in its own sphere and place beyond, 
presenting the phases of nature in its spiritual 
attire, is as natural an existence with its beauty, 
and its hideousness as the slow or rapid de- 
velopment of each individuality from its en- 
vironment, whether it be the animal or plant 
life enables it to exist. The highest develop- 
ment of plant life is not far apart from the low- 
est development of animal life. The life of a 
plant is governed by the same laws that 
governs the life of a man, and all animal life. 
A new discovery has been made by a Prof. Bose 
of Calcutta, India, in the growth of plant life. 



93 



Continuity of Plant Life. 



He has found in his studies and experiments in 
his laboratory, through a very elaborate set of 
instruments, constructed at great expense, and 
wonderful perseverance, a process whereby he 
can not only see the growth of a plant as it 
pushes its stem or radical upward, or the tip 
of the rootlets downward, but can witness the 
heart beats in the plant as it sends up or down 
from its base the sap which contributes to the 
plant growth. The heart beat in the plant is 
as evident and real as in man, not perhaps quite 
as regular in distribution, for in the plant it has 
resting spells and by an immense magnifying 
power, some ten thousand times, it is found that 
it will grow for a few seconds and then rest a 
few seconds. "Certain forms of the apparatus" 
Prof. Bose says, "are so sensitive that they have 
to be enclosed in glass cases and mounted on 
special supports that are built up through the 
building from the foundation and do not touch 
the floors. The same sort of permanent record 
which the Sphygmograph gives for the human 
pulse as it alters with age or emotion or drugs, 
is by this means obtained for every movement 
of any plant magnified up to ten thousand times. 
Such a device will measure the growth of a root. 
The result has been to show that every plant 
and every organ of every plant is excitable." 
All living tissue is really the same in this view. 



94 



Continuity of Plant Life. 



It grows and moves and dies the same way. 
The only difference is that the living animal is 
free to act by its own volition, while the living 
plant is shut up in its case. "The flower stock 
of an ordinary crocus apparently grows 
steadily, but too slow ordinarily to be seen. 
What really happens is that the growing tip 
pushes forward for some five seconds and by a 
space considerably less than the thickness of 
a sheet of tissue paper, then shrinks back again 
for 5 seconds more, until it has lost about half 
its gain, then it rests for 10 seconds and repeats 
the cycle. So the growing tip is really beating 
like a heart and resting half the time, but it 
slows down when the cold strikes it, but loses 
less on the back stroke, than in its advance. 
As the plant is warmed, the pulse becomes more 
rapid up to one complete beat in 10 seconds. 
Here however the drawing back is also in- 
creased with the result that in very hot weather 
while the plant may be very active, the retreat 
offsets the advance and the shoot fails to grow 
permanently at all." 

This I find is true in my own flower bed of 
crocuses; when the hot weather arrives the 
crocus dies. "A root tip behaves in the same 
way. But a root tip has the sense of touch, and 
when in its advance it touches an obstacle, it 
bends a trifle to one side, as it retreats. By this 



95 



Continuity of Plant Life. 



simple device the rootlet works through the 
crevices of the soil, twisting and turning and 
dodging as if it saw the path which in reality it 
only feels. Almost anything that would affect an 
animal, alters the growth movement of a plant. 
A particular seeding that had stopped growing 
from thirst, when given a thimbleful of water 
on its roots, started up again for 3 minutes 
while each successive thimbleful thereafter 
produced another 3 minutes growth with the 
regularity of a 'penny-in-the-slot' machine. A 
dash of cold water on the root of a growing 
plant stiffens it up like a fly on a frosty morning, 
but hot water, (not too hot), may jump the 
growth rate twenty times the normal amount. 
Whiskey poured on the roots stops the growing. 
Light beer causes two or three violent beats to 
alternate spasmodically with about as many 
weak ones. Ether puts the plant to sleep and 
stops all growth movement. The living layer of 
a plant proves to be in continuous motion, writh- 
ing and squirming and twisting, pushing forth 
and pulling back, responding to every stimulus 
of the environment precisely like the tissues 
of an animal. Any soft part of a plant, stamens 
or tendrils, shocked with an electric charge, 
pricked with a pin, touched with ice, or 
scratched with sand paper will thereupon jump. 
The jump may be drawing back, like that of a 



96 



Continuity of Plant Life. 



human finger from a hot stove. Some plant 
tissues when stimulated jump like a skeletal 
muscle, while others keep on beating rythmic- 
ally like a heart. A plant gets weary of work- 
ing like an animal, it will rest a while and in 
a few minutes the heart action starts up again 
and the plant goes to work after it rests and 
grows again. Naturally all plants are slow. 
The quickest of them are 4000 times slower 
than a cat. The entire living portion of a plant 
has also a nervous system. It can therefore be 
etherized by wetting a green part, either lightly 
so that the plant recovers its power of move- 
ment in a few moments or more deeply so that 
the vegetable does not come out for hours. 
Alcohol first excites the plant and afterward 
makes it sluggish and dopy." 

We cannot comprehend any destruction of 
life, in plant or animal. Unlike matter, it is 
something indestructible and cannot in any 
event be blotted out of existence ; time and eter- 
nity cannot destroy it. 



97 



CHAPTER XVII 



The Vastness of the Universe. 

Is there any limit to the universe? Among 
the ancients the belief more or less prevailed 
that the starry heavens were a crystal vault, or 
a large ice belt surrounding us, and the points 
called stars simply prominent crystals project- 
ing from the ice mass. This notion was at last 
dispelled, but the earth was still supposed to 
be the center of the universe around which all 
bodies in space revolved, and not until the six- 
teenth century did Copernicus, after investigat- 
ing the Ptolemaic, Phythogrean and Egyptian 
systems, together with that of Aristotle and 
Phillolans, announce to the world that the moon 
only revolved around the earth, while the lat- 
ter, situated between the orbits of Venus and 
Mars, revolved with all the planets around the 
sun. It was not long before they accepted the 
Copernican system, although the astronomer 
died before it was recognized by the savants. 
Galileo must first suffer imprisonment for 
its advocacy and today the system is so gen- 
erally acknowledged that no one dare oppose it. 
The age has so far advanced, that astronomical 
facts and laws are no longer a matter of specu- 
lation, but are actually demonstrated or proven 



98 



The V astness of the Universe. 

by systematical, mathematical calculations. 
One is not obliged to climb the top of St. Peter's 
in Rome to ascertain its height, but by taking 
certain angles below, its measurement can be 
given exact. So with the stars, their distances 
from the earth can be easily found, and not 
measured by miles but by the radius of the 
earth's orbit or path around the sun, and by 
mathematical reasoning their velocity and size 
in many instances accurately ascertained. Our 
sun even although holding and controlling all 
matter within billions of miles in its group does 
not reign supreme as the center of the universe, 
but is moving on through space towards the 
constellation of Hercules with astounding rapid- 
ity, dragging her dependent planets along with 
her. Alcyone the central star in that beautiful 
cluster called Pleides in Taurus was fixed upon 
by some ancients as the center of the universe, 
around whom the stars revolved and upon 
which was situated the throne of God. This is 
now amended by substituting another center, 
far beyond our unaided vision, around which 
Alcyone and the circle of stars filling the area 
of our limited vision revolve. The extent of 
this vast universe is beyond the comprehension 
of man. To comprehend anything of which we 
can have no practical knowledge upon the earth 
is an impossibility. We can conceive of space 



99 



The Vastness of the Universe. 

about us limited but of unlimited space we 
cannot. 

A limit to anything imaginable must be 
necessarily bounded by something beyond it. 
So with the universe, a limited universe or one 
with a center implies a boundary, and what 
shall it be bounded by? What lies beyond it? 
Matter? What form of matter? And if not 
matter can it be something besides space? Can 
anything exist without space? And if space 
what shall form the line of limit between the 
limited universe if one were to exist, and this 
space beyond? Shall it be walled? If it 
appears at first thought that the universe must 
be limited, reflect and consider that if space 
lies beyond the supposed limit (and the absence 
of space is incomprehensible) why is not that 
included in the universe, a part and parcel 
thereof? In a word does not the universe in- 
clude all, everything, whether matter, force, 
thought, spirit, time or space? What can pos- 
sibly exist outside of it? Nothing within the 
scope of our conception. It would appear then 
that a limited universe, and one with a center, 
is incomprehensible. 

The immensity of the universe can be par- 
tially understood by examining the records of 
distances of some of the stars from us. Accord- 
ing to Guillemin, a German astronomer, the 



100 



The Vastness of the Universe. 

nearest fixed star is 211,330 times the radius 
of the earth's orbit, or put into miles the radius 
of the earth's orbit is about 95,000,000 miles, 
which multiplied by 211,330 times the radius of 
said orbit equals 20,076,350,000,000 miles dis- 
tant, and this distance is so great that light 
traveling at the rate of about 192,000 miles per 
second, or around the earth 1\ times in a second 
would take some 3| years to reach us. Sirius, 
the dog star, is computed to be some 130,625,- 
000,000,000 miles from the earth, and the time 
it would take for its light to reach us, should 
it start on its journey from Sirius today, would 
be about 22 years, or to make the distance from 
us still more comprehensible, suppose it were 
possible for an express train travelling at the 
rate of 30 miles an hour night and day, to reach 
Sirius, the dog star, it would take 72 million 
years to complete the distance. Some stars 
seen only by the largest telescope are so dis- 
tant from us, that should a ray of light start 
from them at this moment it would take a hun- 
dred thousand years to reach us and it is 
probable that if we could wing our flight to 
these distant stars we should find just as many 
in the unlimited distance beyond us as those 
left behind, and should we continue our flight 
onward worlds beyond would ever meet our 
gaze. 



101 



The Vastness of the Universe. 

The spaces between some of the fixed stars 
or any other heavenly bodies are immense and 
astronomers in their searching observation have 
discovered in the farthest regions of space, im- 
mense spaces, millions of miles, where there 
appears to be nothing visible therein, hence 
plenty of room is apparent for the spirits of our 
own species and all animal species as well as of 
all plant life and all life upon all the planets in 
our own solar system and all systems through- 
out the entire universe to soar and develop 
through all eternity. 

We thus begin to creep into the shadow of 
dim realization, that we are but a drop in the 
vast universal ocean and can comprehend as 
little of the immensity of the universe as the 
infant at its mother's breast can intelligently 
understand the vastness and area occupied by 
land and water upon the earth's surface. 



102 



CHAPTER XVIII 

The Destiny of the Earth and its Inhabitants. 

The question now arises what becomes of 
man millions of years in the future upon the 
earth? As our planet came into existence with- 
out any visible habitant upon its surface, it is 
probable that it will pass away without any 
visible habitant and disintegrate into space. 

Worlds are being born and worlds are ripen- 
ing into old age and disintegrating throughout 
eternity. How can it be otherwise, for there is 
only one universe, and something is not created 
out of nothing. There are only changes of 
form, changing from one form into another, 
one dying, so to speak, and another world, no 
matter how small or large, forming out of the 
same material as the one just dying, disinte- 
grating, crumbling, or dissolving and passing 
into a nebula mass. If there were new worlds 
forming from time to time and none disinte- 
grating in course of eternity the universe would 
be overcrowded. It is possible, I don't say 
probable, that this change may be the same 
with man and the entire animal kingdom. 
There is no such thing as complete rest, every 
blessed thing in space is in motion and man is 
no exception. He dies and his body disinte- 



103 



The Destiny of the Earth and its Inhabitants. 



grates and passes into the ground and goes in 
the process of eternity to form another world 
and we cannot tell but what his material body 
may pass in time into making up of an inhab- 
itant of some new world in the process of 
formation as before described and thus move 
on through eternity (time without end) in the 
ever changing process from one form to another 
forever and ever. Astronomers are agreed that 
the moon is in its dotage and possibly has had 
its period of inhabitancy. The proof of its non- 
inhabitancy is based on the fact that the occup- 
ation of a star, as it passes behind the moon, 
passes clear without any apparent mist in view, 
or dimness, or clouds, which indicates that there 
is no atmosphere surrounding it, and if no 
atmosphere no water upon it is possible, and 
we cannot understand in our earthly experi- 
ence how any inhabitant can exist there under 
these conditions. And again the powerful tel- 
escopes now in operation in the large observ- 
atories discover on the face of the satellite huge 
precipices and large extinct volcanoes exhibit- 
ing very uneven surfaces, and indicating that 
there must have been a great upheaval of the 
surface in the last throes of its active habitable 
life. The moon being many times smaller than 
the earth, developed life faster. 

Astronomers are generally agreed that the 



104 



The Destiny of the Earth and its Inhabitants. 

Sun will gradually in the course of millions of 
years lose the larger portion of its heat and 
become at last as cool as the Earth we inhabit. 
When that occurs the Earth will lose its inhab- 
itancy, for no life can exist and flourish here in 
the absence of heat and light. 

I can picture in my mind a million of years, 
more or less, the temperate zone in which zone 
is my abode, being entirely destitute of inhab- 
itants, not only of man, but all animal creation. 
Life will probably flourish in the torrid zone in 
the region of the equator longer, but as the 
years roll on the inhabitants will be scattering. 
Only the hardiest, who can stand the rigors of 
the cold climate, will be able to survive and 
linger for a brief period. The "survival of the 
fittest" will certainly be in evidence at that 
stage of the earth's existence. For further 
elucidation of this train of thought I'll refer 
you to my book in all prominent public libraries, 
entitled, "Breaking Up ; or the Birth, Develop- 
ment and Death of our Planet in Story." 

Man is very far from reaching the zenith of 
his earthly achievements in the present era. It 
is possible in ages to come the man of today will 
be viewed as far behind in civilization as we 
view our predecessors ages ago. The changes 
in climatic conditions of our planet as it loses 
the heat from the sun ages to come will be very 



105 



The Destiny of the Earth and its Inhabitants. 

gradual, the change in a century would hardly 
be noticed; several thousands of years would 
pass away before any marked change could be 
manifest. Evidences of migration in ages past 
from the cold of the Arctics to warmer zones 
are found in fossiliferous deposits, such as some 
species of plants and remains of hairy elephants 
that once flourished in the Arctic zone. It was 
necessary then that such animals as the 
elephant must have hair upon their bodies to 
keep them warm, but as they migrated farther 
south there was no need of hairy bodies for 
warmth and their hide became as hairless as 
observed today. As the sun gradually ex- 
pends its surplus heat and solidifies from its 
fiery, gaseous mass into a solid body, it will 
undoubtedly be able to populate its surface with 
animals the same as our planet has been doing 
in the past. What sort of life, what species 
and forms of animal and floral life will develop 
is useless to prophesy, but surely it must come 
for nothing in the universe is at a standstill — 
unrest is everywhere visible — the young is ever- 
lastingly growing old in animal and floral life. 

Von Humboldt, the great German philosopher 
and scientist, claimed that at the depth of 21 
miles the earth's interior was sufficiently hot to 
melt the hardest rock or metal and that the 
eruption of volcanoes belching their fiery flame 



106 



The Destiny of the Earth and its Inhabitants. 



and sending forth from the interior masses of 
melted lava is evidence of the terrific heat in 
the bowels of the earth. Von Humboldt also 
says the earth's crust is compared to the shell 
of an egg with a fly walking on its surface. In 
my travels in many gold and silver mines in 
California and Nevada the deeper I descended 
in these mines the hotter it became. One in 
Nevada, at the depth of 1600 feet, I found so 
hot that water in perspiring would run from 
my face, and in one place an egg could be 
boiled in 15 minutes. Heat increases one 
degree for every 60 feet descent. This interior 
heat will in process of time escape and then the 
earth will become cold and man and all life 
will become scarce upon the earth's surface. 

Between the planets Jupiter and Mars there 
are a number of asteroids or planets floating in 
their regular orbits around the sun numbering a 
few hundred. It is conjectured by some astron- 
omers that at one time there was a mother 
planet in that region, and by some unexplained 
incident it exploded and scattered all these 
minor planets or asteroids in space. Some of 
them are from 5 to 10 miles in diameter and 
others very small, considerable less than a mile 
in size. This hypothesis seems reasonable 
when we see the immense force of earthquakes 
and volcanoes rending the surface of the earth, 



107 



The Destiny of the Earth and its Inhabitants. 



or it may be that the cohesive attraction of its 
particles lost its grip in some unbeknown man- 
ner and disintegrated and separated. A recent 
statement by Frank E. Perret, the eminent 
student of volcanoes and earthquakes, says that 
in his opinion these asteroids are the result 
of the planet exploding by the pent up gases, so 
he thinks that volcanoes on our planet are 
necessary as a vent to let ofl the gases in its 
interior. 



108 



CHAPTER XIX 

The Earth's Development. 

The earth is yet young, although some two 
hundred million or more years of age. Earth- 
quakes and volcanoes must cease ere our planet 
is fully developed. The interior is constantly 
solidifying so that in course of millions of years 
it will become a solid mass. When this takes 
place earthquakes and volcanoes can no longer 
exist ; as this condensation process is continued, 
the earth from necessity is diminishing in size. 
One has but to travel over the face of the earth 
to discover the fact that its development has 
but fairly commenced and that man must to a 
large extent be the instrument to perfect it. 
Not one thousandth part of the land of our globe 
is cultivated. Every inch of ground must be 
tilled and made to return one hundred, aye, one 
thousand more product to its inhabitants than 
in the past. Stagnant ponds and lakes must 
be drained and beautiful farms flourish upon 
their beds. All space except very large bodies 
of water upon the planet must be turned to our 
best advantage, then and not till then will 
Paradise be gained and the grand old earth 
attain a ripe age. 

Wild and savage animals must be eliminated 



109 



The Earth's Development. 



from the face of the earth. Glance at the 
animals left in America. Not many years since 
(but a few hundred) the wild beasts roamed 
from the cold regions to the equator. America 
teemed with them. Where are they today? 
The march of civilization has driven them back, 
one species after another of the highest order 
of beasts have been exterminated, so that today 
where civilization advances, nothing remains of 
the wild beasts (except a few rare specimens of 
various species roaming in the jungle) to indi- 
cate the homes they once enjoyed, but their 
bones, and these through the aptness of the 
Yankee are rapidly gathered and converted into 
manufacturing and agricultural purposes, as 
for instance in the northern portion of America 
where immense quantities of bones of the ele- 
phant are dug up, also remains of the animals 
of the bone beds of Carolina, all being utilized 
and their original form destroyed, so that in 
the future, not even the bones of beasts will 
remain to mark the pre-existence of the higher 
orders of animal life except here and there a 
relic stored away in a museum, hence it is no 
wonder that we cannot find the "missing link" 
that has puzzled the anthropologist for years. 
The gap in ages past between the pre-historic 
animals and the present animal creation has 
been lost by the wholesale slaughter of animals 



110 



The Earth's Development. 



by our predecessors and the gap will continue 
to widen as time rolls on and other links of 
animals in ages to come will be lost and no trace 
of them found unless museum collectors gather 
and preserve them. Take the lower races of 
men, the gap is widening here. The living link 
between civilization of today and the pre- 
historic man is fast becoming the missing link by 
the extermination of the aborigines. 

Look at North America, the native home of 
the poor Indian, from the Lakes to the Gulf, 
from the Atlantic to the Pacific. The European 
advances, he plants himself in their homes, the 
Indian is doomed! The work of extermination 
is going on and a few only remain to remind 
us of the original extensive tribes. Back ! back ! 
they have been driven to the farthest extent of 
our realm and the only home that now awaits 
this small remnant of the aborigines of America 
is absorption by marriage in American families 
or the watery deep of the Pacific. 

The Australian savage is being also rapidly 
exterminated, but few remain to indicate the 
existence of this very low order of men, the low- 
est living on the face of the earth. Hence the 
highest orders of beasts being rapidly extermi- 
nated in all countries by the advancing tide of 
civilization and the equally rapid extermina- 
tion of the lowest races of men on the globe 



111 



The Earth's Development. 



will in the course of a hundred thousand years 
distant vastly widen the gap and the "missing 
link" in that age will prove a far greater puzzle. 

It is fair to presume that further advanced 
types of quadrumana that were nearly allied 
to man than now exists became extinct and 
buried in the vast accumulation of ages. Pale- 
ontology is in its infancy, for the time is com- 
paratively recent since the discovery and 
classification of fossil remains. Is it not equally 
probable that types or races of men, much lower 
than any of which we have record and more 
closely allied to the quadrumana and quadru- 
peds may have existed in the Miocene and pos- 
sibly in the Eocene Age ? Geologists are aware 
that many forms became extinct before the 
appearance of mammals upon the earth, as for 
instance nine species of trilobites became extinct 
at the close of the Primordial, one of the earliest 
ages ; eight species at the close of the Silurian ; 
and all became extinct before the close of the 
Carboniferous or coal age, which was many mil- 
lions of years prior to the age of mammals, 
which includes all animals that suckle their 
young, and what is true of trilobites is true of 
many genera and thousands of species appear- 
ing in one age became extinct before the close 
of the following age. 



112 



CHAPTER XX. 



The Stars in Space. 

Turn to the stars and watch their motions in 
space. Day after day, year after year, century 
after century, thousands upon thousands of 
years roll on, without any change being appar- 
ent in them. Yet the change going on is con- 
stant, but the existence of man on the earth is 
so brief compared to the development of a 
planet, that man cannot ordinarily measure the 
growth and decay of these bodies. 

The earth is but one-seventeen-hundredth as 
large as in its infancy. Humboldt tells us that 
if the elevated portions of the earth continue 
to wear away as rapidly as at present in two 
million of years the earth will be leveled to the 
sea and then what of the life of man upon its 
surface? Nothing left but the fishes of the 
deep, and the earth returning and retro- 
gressing into its original primeval state when 
fishes and crustaceans were the only animals 
first developed and the earth one vast universal 
ocean. This will be the beginning of the decay, 
decomposition and disintegration of the form 
of the earth as it passes into its original nebula 
mass from which it came as heretofore 
described. 



113 



The Stars in Space. 



All the fixed stars in space are known as suns 
with planets revolving around them, as those 
around our own sun. How infinitely vast are 
all the changes taking place throughout the 
universe. To prepare a planet or sun for the 
habitation of man or other forms of being or life 
is a long step and after this step has been 
achieved, it must have taken millions of years 
to mature the elaborate frame and perfect the 
vast, intricate, matchless system of nerves and 
brain of man. I am old and ancient and the 
history of the earth is my history, the develop- 
ment of the solar system is my development and 
the changes in the universe are but changes in 
the great whole of which I have been and am 
and ever will be a part and parcel. How vast, 
then, must have been the transition in the de- 
velopment of the human body alone in evolving 
from the lowest to the higher through the line 
of ages in the past. It simply contributes to 
the long chain of evidence in support of the 
eternal law of transition throughout all forms 
of matter. The sun and planets are constantly 
developing and preparing in the course of ages 
for the introduction of life upon their surfaces, 
and why should they not, for they are bone of 
our bone and flesh of our flesh. The mass of 
the sun so many times greater than our earth 
will take longer to develop life upon its surface, 



114 



The Stars in Space. 



for it is some 1,400,000 times greater in volume 
than our little planet. The sun and planets of 
which we are part and parcel contains (as I 
have before described) the same properties that 
our earth contains as confirmed by the Spectro- 
scope, an instrument that is one of the most 
important aids to astronomical science that has 
been invented in the past century. 

It is an instrument with a prism and three 
tubes used by chemists for chemical analysis 
and by astronomers for the analysis of the com- 
position of the stars. Certain lines of coloration 
on some surfaces are seen through the instru- 
ment, which indicates, as it does in chemical 
analysis of substances on the earth, by which 
certain metals or other substances by said 
coloration are detected. The sun is found to 
contain sodium, iron, hydrogen, magnesium, 
copper, zinc, calcium, nickel, etc., etc. The 
common origin of bodies in the solar system is 
substantiated through spectrum analysis, as 
comprising most of the elements the earth con- 
tains. Most of the stars examined contain 
properties that contribute to the support of 
life. If our globe was originally a fiery liquid, 
nebula mass, then all manner of forms now 
upon it, man, beasts, all animal life, trees, 
rocks, etc., were apparently one and the same 
thing in development in this universal boiling, 



115 



The Stars in Space. 



seething cauldron. Analyze the grave, after 
the body is entirely decomposed and the most 
skillful chemist cannot detect the faintest trace 
of the body as distinct from the earth from 
which it came. 

The muscles of man contains soda, blood, 
potash and iron. Bone contains phosphorus and 
magnesia, the body in general is made up of 
oxygen, hydrogen, carbon, nitrogen, chlorine, 
albumen, etc., elements common to beasts, 
plants, and soil. 



116 



CHAPTER XXI. 



Electrical Future. 

We have endeavored to demonstrate that life, 
spirit, the soul, is separate from the body, that 
when death occurs, life, spirit, soul passes into 
the realms of space, and that under certain 
peculiar and rare conditions it has and can 
communicate with spirits dwelling in living 
bodies upon the earth. It don't matter under 
what ism you put it, if it is a fact, "a rose will 
smell just as sweet under any other name." I 
can see no reason if as the Swedenborgian, and 
members of the evangelical faith claim that the 
souls or spirits of our departed friends are 
hovering about us and are cognizant of our 
doings about here, that they cannot go a step 
further if conditions are right and communicate 
as is recorded in the old Bible times, and tele- 
phone to us, as do we upon the earth telephone 
with our living friends three or four thousand 
miles distant. There are certain conditions that 
must be followed in one as the other and how 
do we know but that some electrical manipula- 
tions, as before explained, can be and are 
utilized in the spheres above, the home of our 
departed friends, with as great possibilities as 
here with us. In the hands and genius of an 



117 



Electrical Future. 



Edison, in the hereafter, what seems now an 
impossibility may prove a reality, like the 
"Moving Picture" exhibitions, which has been 
made to talk, seemed an impossibility. Elec- 
tricity throughout the universe is a great factor 
in the motion of worlds, it has an attractive and 
repelling force and as I have stated more fully 
in my book entitled "New Propositions in 
Practical and Speculative Philosophy" in which 
I claim that electricity has as much to do in the 
motion of all bodies in the starry vault as gravis 
tation, discovered by Isaac Newton. This book 
may be found in the Public Libraries of large 
cities in United States. The earth is young yet, 
its youth is nothing in comparison to the ages 
taken in the development and change of form 
of the heavenly bodies scattered in space 
throughout the Universe. The very narrow 
limit of time in which electrical wonders have 
been developed in the past century and also the 
very narrow limit of time in which departed 
spirits have endeavored to make themselves 
manifest in recent years to us here upon the 
earth, is as nothing in comparison to the time 
which it has taken, aye thousands of years to 
demonstrate the power of electricity and make 
it talk and send messages to the outer limits of 
the earth, and so it stands us in hand to be 
patient for it may take fully as long a time to 



118 



Electrical Future. 



produce equal results between the two worlds in 
electrical manipulations and make it possible 
that more ready and easier conditions will be 
brought about for communications from our 
departed and dear friends. 

Who could have prophesied a century ago 
that through the atmosphere covering the earth 
communication could be made without the aid 
of wires, or any connected or continued line as 
has been done by wireless telegraph? 

It is my belief that the hour is coming when 
it will be established through science, and 
science alone, that electrical communication 
will be placed on a solid basis between the 
world of our departed friends and our own, and 
what has been known as rare attempts now and 
then in the past in the transmission of messages 
from beyond, will be in the distant future, a 
common occurrence, when the possibilities of 
the electrical current has been more fully 
studied and experimented upon. My body will 
long be in the grave, long before, perhaps a 
century or centuries. Eternity is before us, and 
the revelations of the possibilities of nature's 
forces will be more fully realized after patient 
and long continued researches. 



119 



CHAPTER XXII. 



Right Living. 

It has been my purpose to demonstrate in 
these pages that there is no such thing as a 
beginning or ending to anything on the face of 
the earth or in the starry heavens, only change 
of form. 

Can you imagine how anything can begin 
from nothing? If it began, where did the thing 
that constituted the beginning come from, and 
if it ended, where did it go? 

Some of my readers may be curious to know 
if I believe in a God; most certainly I do, but 
not in a personal, individualized God. There 
is something which I call intelligence pervad- 
ing the Universe, of which all nature is part and 
parcel. The conception of God, or the Powers 
that be, is beyond me and beyond the compre- 
hension of anybody else, be he saint or sinner. 

In conclusion, let it be said if you live right, 
you'll die right. The better in morals and in- 
telligence one lives here, the better and higher 
in the spheres beyond will be his right of way. 
Hence it behooves everybody in this life to do 
everything within his power to elevate and 
make good every human being and leave the 
world better for having lived in it. The time 



120 



Right Living. 



will come in no very distant future when the 
era of man living in this the Twentieth Century, 
will be looked upon as a dark, barbarous age, 
as dark as in the dark ages of ancient Rome, 
when innocent men were killed and tortured in 
"cold blood" for nothing but to satisfy the dis- 
play of official power; and today half of the 
entire world, and in fact part of the other half, 
are fighting for what? For supremacy and 
power, thrusting bayonets into each other, and 
sending a bullet into innocent soldiers, standing 
in the open as a target, for what? To satisfy 
the unbounded ambition of their leaders to re- 
tain or gain more power, concerning which the 
poor uncommissioned soldier is not consulted. 
Life is a serious problem, waste the essence of 
it here and you will rue the day when you pass 
the threshold beyond. You have had your 
chance and should you spend it in riotous living, 
you will have to take your pill and grovel in the 
lowest depths in the world of departed spirits. 
Nothing is more certain. Live a pure and un- 
defined life here, with a corresponding desire 
for an ever increasing intelligence, promotion 
to an advanced position in the sphere beyond 
is certain to be your reward. 

Above my desk I keep constantly before me 
an engraved motto by some saint, as follows : 
"I shall pass through this world but 



121 



Bight Living. 

once. Any good therefore that I can do, 
or any kindness that I can show to every 
human being, let me do it now. Let me not 
defer or neglect it, for I shall not pass this 
way again." 

THE END. 



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